PARLIAMENTARY SUPREMACY

Parliamentary Supremacy



Parliamentary Supremacy

Introduction

The paper discusses the extent to which the British parliament's supremacy can be consistent to the codified system. The British parliamentary structure does not emphasize a codified constitution due to the customs and traditions embedded in the British political since years.

Parliament Supremacy

Parliament supremacy is a controversial concept, which disputes about its desirability and nature. According to some analyst, the parliament sovereignty is being compromised through the codification of the instruction. The desirability of the sovereignty arguments suggests that the codification hampers the flexibility and strengthens the parliament. However, other believe that the supremacy of the parliament is the major barrier to the existence of a codified constitution, requisite to its unique riles and regulatory requirements. They believe that a codified system will be incompatible with the constitution of parliamentary sovereignty. The development of parliament supremacy emerged from the English civil war. Since then, it expanded and remained a dominant theme in British politics. The MP's which represent the constitutional via representative democracy are handed over the powers to assess, reject or pass legislations.

Codified Constitution

There are a number of countries, which have a codified constitution. The codified sanctions are the result of some dramatic political change, often known as a revolution. The method on which country adopts a constitution pertains to the political and historical consent requiring this change. The legality of codified constitution is tied to the procedures by which they are initially adopted. The states that have codified constitutions had the constitution supremacy over the ordinary statute law. If there is a conflict between the codified constitution and a constitutional statute, some or complete part can be declared as “ultra vires”, and is struck down as unconstitutional.

The procedures required to amend a constitution may include constitutional convention, requiring a superiority of legislators' votes, convocation of a special constituent assembly, or a referendum process. The constitution may provide the safeguard of their basic principles, even by amendments. If a former valid amendment of the constitution infringes the principles against the amendment, it may develop a so called unconstitutional constitutional law. Codified law comprises of a ceremonial preamble that outlines the state goals and the motivation of the constitution. The preamble omitted in some constitutions may carry a reference to God, or a fundamental value of the state like democracy, liberty or human rights.

The British Political System and Parliament Supremacy

As per the definition put lined by the House of Lords in 2001, the UK has a constitution, by virtue of the fact that the government operates on the laws of the land. Yet, there is a heated debate, both academic and cultural, about the nature of the political constitution. Some pints declare the ancient origins of the nation's political system and custom. These customs do not provide as great extent of consistency between parliament supremacy and the codification of the constitution. The lack of constitutionalism and the promotion of these laws are the possible factors, which did not assign significance to the ...