Summary

Origin of the programme¶

I did not begin with a desire to write a constitution for its own sake. It began with a practical constitutional observation: the House of Commons has become too much the machine by which government supervises the citizen, and too little the means by which the citizen supervises government. The purpose of this programme is to restore Parliament's primary constitutional work: scrutiny of executive power, control of public money, presentation of grievances, supervision of public bodies, and maintenance of the law. The Constitution exists to secure that restoration.

Central diagnosis¶

Statute has been used for power while liberty was left to ancient custom. The modern constitutional problem has not usually come by tyranny, but by accumulation.

Constitutional method¶

The Constitution is to government what legislation is to citizens: it defines prohibited acts and limits of authority. What is not prohibited remains politically open. The Constitution should not become a programme for government.

Public power¶

Public power is held on trust for the public good. Parliament is entrusted with public power for the peace, liberty, security, prosperity, justice, and good government of the Kingdom. Delegation is permitted. Orphan power is not. Operational independence may protect particular judgments. It must never abolish accountability, reporting, audit or redress.

Foundational theory: each equal free person¶

The programme does not rest upon the abstract sovereignty of a collective called “the People.” It rests upon the liberty and dignity of each equal free person under God and the Common Law. Where the programme speaks of the people, it means the citizens of the Kingdom, each possessing rights and duties, acting together through lawful constitutional forms. Parliament, ministers, courts, and public offices are trustees and servants of that settlement.

Redress¶

The state must prove its authority. The citizen need not prove his freedom. Where public authority interferes with liberty, property, livelihood, lawful activity, status, licence, benefit or protected interest, the burden of proof lies on the authority. No public right is real unless the citizen can afford to enforce it.

Justice shall not be sold. In any proceedings, once each party's recoverable costs have been assessed according to the ordinary rules, the lower recoverable costs figure should set the maximum recoverable costs award available to either side. Court procedure should be settled on the presumption that any litigant may be a litigant in person.

Financial stewardship¶

Public money is not the government’s money. It is the people’s money, taken by law and held on trust for lawful public purposes. The Chancellor should be guardian of that trust within government; the Commons should be guardian of that trust over government; and the taxpayer should be able to see how that trust is being kept. Money Bills remain a matter of Commons primacy only within the constitutional fiscal ceiling.

New Lords¶

The New Lords provides the longer constitutional view within Parliament. It is not principally a constitutional court; it does not govern; it does not compete with the Commons. It is the parliamentary chamber of constitutional memory, restraint and review. It completes the promise left unfinished by the Parliament Act 1911 by defining the powers of an elected second chamber.

Deadlock¶

The Parliament Acts solved the problem of their day and should be amended to reflect the new settlement with an elected second chamber. Money Bills remain subject to Commons primacy within the fiscal ceiling. Clear manifesto Bills may proceed under a narrowed Parliament Act procedure. General Bills and Constitutional Bills use the same returning-Bill, second-rejection, National Reference Resolution, and plebiscite procedure. Constitutional Bills may begin in either House, but must be considered by a Committee of the Whole House in both Houses. A Bill containing any constitutional provision is itself a Constitutional Bill, and constitutional classification takes precedence over manifesto or other status. Private Bills, provisional order Bills and delegated legislation are not subject to Parliament Act override. Delegated legislation is not protected by Commons primacy and the New House of Lords is under no duty to approve it; if rejected, it fails unless replaced by primary legislation.

Delegated legislation

Primary legislation is the rule. Delegated legislation is an exceptional concession for machinery, commencement and technical administration, not a routine method of governing the citizen. If a matter substantially affects life, liberty, property, livelihood, rights, duties, liabilities or constitutional position, it should be brought to Parliament as primary legislation.

Foreign affairs¶

Ordinary foreign affairs and lawful treaties remain the responsibility of ministers answerable to Parliament. The constitutional threshold governing any transfer of authority outside the United Kingdom is stated in Article 6 of the Common Law Constitution and applied in Part III, section 10.

Emergency powers¶

Emergency powers may permit the state to act quickly in a crisis, but crisis must not become a second constitution.

ECHR and HRA¶

The ECHR and Human Rights Act are enumerated-rights instruments. This paper proceeds from common-law principles: ancient liberties, government under law, freedom unless lawfully restrained, and remedies against unlawful power.

Devolution¶

Commons and Lords reform concern the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Devolved assemblies cannot opt out of Westminster reform while remaining represented in the House of Commons. The application of the Common Law Constitution to devolved institutions and devolved matters is a separate question. England’s lack of its own devolved chamber is recognised but left for another day.

Constitutional statutes, manner and form, and amendment¶

The programme builds upon the existing doctrine that constitutional statutes are not silently displaced by implication, while recognising that procedural rules concerning Money Bills, fiscal ceilings, New Lords consent, and popular reference are a more ambitious manner-and-form settlement. The Constitution does not pretend to be unamendable. It makes constitutional change deliberate, express, visible, and politically accountable, rather than accidental, implied, administrative, or hidden.

Established Liberties¶

The Constitution preserves the historic liberties recognised by the common law rather than creating new rights. Those liberties were developed over centuries through judicial decisions and form part of the constitutional inheritance of the Kingdom.

Economic policy and practical application¶

The economic proposals in Part IV are illustrative examples of the practical outworking of the programme’s principles. They are not entrenched constitutional provisions unless expressly incorporated into the Constitution itself. They may be amended, refined, replaced, or developed by ordinary democratic government, provided they remain within the constitutional settlement.

Implementation formula¶

Test for future amendments¶

Any proposed amendment should be tested by asking whether it strengthens the citizen’s ability to supervise government through Parliament; makes public power more visible, lawful, accountable and redressable; preserves the common-law character of the settlement; belongs in the Constitution rather than Enabling Legislation; and preserves the founding diagnosis that statute has been used for power while liberty was left to ancient custom.