FT editor Lionel Barber and FT news editor Matthew Garrahan discuss what the Supreme Court’s decision means for the prime minister, parliament and Brexit. Read more at
Britain’s supreme court has delivered a devastating defeat to boris johnson in a unanimous ruling 11 judges have ruled that his decision to suspend parliament which was deliberating on brexit was unlawful here with me is mathew guerra han the news editor to discuss this frankly epic moment in the history of britain as a constitutional difficulty it was epic lionel
How the scale of it and the language the harshness of the language in this ruling was quite unprecedented wasn’t it well britain’s supreme court is only 10 years old it’s not like the us supreme court that goes back to 1787 but in a way this was as big as a very important judgement back in 1801 called marbury versus madison where essentially the us supreme court
Ruled against the executive and set out the parameters of power for the executive and the legislature and the courts and this was this moment even though we have an unlit unwritten constitution in the uk and what do you think the immediate repercussions of it will be well for mr. johnson given the language which was again ruthless it argued contrary to what the
Government said that this was a matter for the courts not just a matter of politics that the executive had clearly abused its powers and that parliament’s role as holding the executive to account deliberating in public on matters of state that this all these matters have been infringed so for mr. johnson as prime minister has some very hard questions to answer
About whether its position as prime minister is tenable which is quite something i mean he’s waking up in new york currently he’s there on a visit to the un what does what does he do next i mean parliament will presumably reopen tomorrow and mps will will sit again what what happens after that well first of all the the court made clear that the parliament had not
Actually been paroled because it was unlawful and so they should in fact be sitting but they left it to the speaker of the house of commons john burke oh 2ds victory for him is a big a big one for geena milho by the way who brought the suit in the first place when joe cherry but and by the way another very important point that the supreme court ruled in exactly
The same way as strongly as the supreme court in scotland the court of session so you have a sort of unanimity between england wales and scotland that’s important for the united kingdom but what next well i think mr. johnson’s going to deliberate at the united nations with his inner circle and he’s going to face a parliament come back and he will have to answer
Questions about whether his position is sustainable he’s let it be known last night that he intended to stay on whatever the ruling he also said he was gonna study the the ruling carefully but we are in untested waters aren’t we i mean that for the british prime minister to have been called in court that his actions were unlawful is something we this is this is a
New ground for us it definitely is and you know there is a history on mr. johnson’s part of brazen about facing controversy from plagiarism to to other matters and shall we say this of course is on a different scale this involves matters high matters of state and constitutional propriety and just the way this thing was managed i mean remember he and his circled
Prorogue they decide to pro parliament ask the queen’s support which they got the royal assent for suspending parliament i mean essentially the ruling is supports the fact that he misled the queen you know he said it was just – he wanted a new parliament to discuss his do you think given this ruling i mean the approach of his administration of it of his of his
Advisers dominic cummings think the key one has been to ride fairly roughshod over convention do you think that this necessitates a change if if he stays i think it’s important to recognize that mr. johnson and his spin gauley adviser dominic cummings said that in order to achieve brexit we must get it by october the 31st now come what no ifs or buts no ifs or buts
And because there’s been too much delay three years already since the referendum and that’s why they wanted to put pressure both on parliament and on the eu to get a deal that doesn’t seem to be much progress here and by the way on that deal but my final point is that it’s really important to distinguish between constitutional propriety and the brexit question
In effect the the judges were not saying whether it was right to respect or not the referendum result they were saying the the the executive mr. johnson has infringed and abused his power regarding parliament’s role and so that is quite different there will be people in the country and i’m sure some conservative newspapers who will denounce the judges as enemies
Of the ps and i think this is completely wrong it’s very damaging for our democracy and they should respect the fact that this was an au n– animus judgment by the top judges in the land on matters of constitutional propriety it goes to the heart of how our democracy can and should work and finally lionel this this this case was so electric because it it was in
A sort of gray area of our unwritten constitution there was some calls outside the court that i heard just now for a more codified formalized written constitution do you think that that is something that we’re gonna get anywhere near and there i think it’s premature to be moving towards a written constitution that’s a very big move i think what what you’ve seen
Today is the court atom break delineate though the limits of power for the executive and the role of democracy of parliament in our democracy that should be enough it should be enough to reflect on let us just say this though given other matters of the constitution we know the strains within the united kingdom we also know about the fact that maybe the house of
Lords isn’t the most efficient it’s a powerful scrutiny there are other questions path of scrutiny or of legislation etc but there are some problems that we have but i think that’s for another day what what we should today celebrate is that the judges stood up very clearly and unanimously for the rule of law mmm battle thank you very much
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UK Supreme Court rules against Boris Johnson – what happens next? | FT By Financial Times
