Is Britain about to leave the EU?

[Lillefix]

It is absolutely clear that a UK which is not a member of the EU should not be bound by a foreign court. It shall have its own court system which shall have sole power to review the laws of the UK.

That is not clear. They are still a member of the council of Europe and is therefore bound by the supranational European court of human rights.

 

[Arakhor]

[The UK] shall have its own court system which shall have sole power to review the laws of the UK.

Unless of course the tabloids are complicit in allowing the Government to bypass the courts and Parliament.

 

[Oerdin]

That is not clear. They are still a member of the council of Europe and is therefore bound by the supranational European court of human rights.

You can claim that to your heart's content but the Prime Minister has made it absolutely clear that no foreign courts shall have any review power in a post Brexit UK. None. She even declared such a demand a red line which could never be accepted.

So it is time for you to start coming back to reality. There will be no ECJ authority in the UK. British laws will be reviewed by British Courts not foreign courts. That is just part of regaining full sovereignty as the people voted to do.

 

[Agent327]

I'm sure. Except, of course, the ECJ is not a 'foreign' court , but an international one. It's the last resort for the EDHR. Also not foreign, but international. (Of course, there's also the ICJ, which is based on the UDHR.)

 

[innonimatu]

An international court is a foreign court. It's outside the power of a particular sovereign country (and that is a feature).

 

[Arakhor]

You can claim that to your heart's content but the Prime Minister has made it absolutely clear that no foreign courts shall have any review power in a post Brexit UK. None. She even declared such a demand a red line which could never be accepted.

As is becoming increasingly clear, the Prime Minister actually gets very little say in the issue. She probably means it, of course, but she doesn't get the final say on the matter by a very long chalk.

 

[Oerdin]

The PM does have the power to negotiate treaties and if she refuses to sign then there is no treaty to vote on. Period. You need to come to reality, my friend, if she says EU courts are unacceptable and a red line she will not cross then that is it. She can simply refuse to sign and the old treaties expire as soon as Article 50's two years are up.

 

[Arakhor]

Well, she can, yes, but that's like saying that the Queen can refuse to sign an act into law. Given that actual negotiators normally handle these things, said scenario should never occur. What's more, one of the minuscule amount of things the PM has said about the whole sordid affair is that she will consent to allow Parliament to vote on the final agreement, at which point she will not be able to overrule their decision anyway.

Of course, as the Supreme Court is likely to make clear, she doesn't get to make or break laws on her tod, as that power is reserved to each sitting Parliament, so it's far more likely that the MPs will get a binding say on the matter long before then.

 

[Traitorfish]

I think that Americans sometimes forget that the British premiership is not at all like the American premiership, and that the prime minister can be desposed at any time and for any reason by a simple majority of either their party or of the Commons, so their theoretically more sweeping authority is in practice much more constrained than those of America's elective monarchs.

We need a dumb smile for people who do not know there is a Parliament in Westminister.

But you said,

That British laws are reviewed by British courts.

And Parliament is not a court, it's a legislative body, and one which only has full legislative authority over England, varying legislative powers in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales being devolved to local legislatures. So the point stands, there's no such thing as "British law" or "British courts" expect in the broad sense of "laws and courts which have authority in Britain", which for the time being includes European laws and European courts.

Perhaps all this "make Britain British" stuff would apply if we were under some hyper-centralised regime like France, but the political and legal reality in the UK is a weird, accidental quasi-federalism, and when we're talking about sovereignty and legislative authority, that sort of thing matters.

 

[Mouthwash]

America's elective monarchs.

I wonder what kind of a monarch (or head of government, for that matter) wouldn't be able to do something like close Guantanamo Bay if they wanted to.

 

[Verbose]

The question seems rather how it could be opened in the first place. A extrajudicial aberration under no legal control, national or international.

 

[Old Hippy]

I wonder what kind of a monarch (or head of government, for that matter) wouldn't be able to do something like close Guantanamo Bay if they wanted to.

only the people can close things like prison camps.... they were responsible for setting them up
At the last election the government run on a strong border protection and security policy... they started their gov. 90 seats to 55 and now have a 1 seat majority, even losing the odd late night motion when somebody sneaks off early
they have a couple of people with a conscious so one can hope we do finally close our 'Guantanamo Bay', and set children and families free

just getting on my hobby horse again....

 

[Yeekim]

That is not clear. They are still a member of the council of Europe and is therefore bound by the supranational European court of human rights.

You can claim that to your heart's content but the Prime Minister has made it absolutely clear that no foreign courts shall have any review power in a post Brexit UK. None. She even declared such a demand a red line which could never be accepted.

So it is time for you to start coming back to reality. There will be no ECJ authority in the UK. British laws will be reviewed by British Courts not foreign courts. That is just part of regaining full sovereignty as the people voted to do.

ECJ and Court of Human Rights are different and while the latter can't annul any national laws, signatories to European Convention of Human Rights have undertaken to abide by its decision.

 

[Verbose]

Either THAT was a sovereign decision, or I demand control of the UK...

 

[really]

Will people be watching the speech in 45 minutes?
I will have my headphones on and watch it here in work.

 

[Arakhor]

I'll read the summaries later. It's probably better for my blood pressure.

 

[Cheetah]

It's a hard Brexit. The UK is leaving the single market.

She holds a very consolidatory, or at least hopeful, tone throughout however, and talking a lot about continuing to be friends and allies with Europe. She wants FTA with Europe, and keep all other European cooperation going.

There's also some Tory lies sprinkled through the speech. Will need some proper analysis to properly figure out.

 

[Arakhor]

Essentially, Britain wants everything it already has, without any commitments or oversight, yet somehow the EU is the bad guy for not compromising?

 

[Flying Pig]

I wonder what kind of a monarch (or head of government, for that matter) wouldn't be able to do something like close Guantanamo Bay if they wanted to.

You could start with just about any European one of either of those. Obama never had a problem ordering the place to be closed: he had a problem over what to do with the people currently held there. The same situation could just as easily emerge in Britain, the Netherlands or Denmark. Even in an 'absolute monarchy', the power to give orders and the power to make them happen is not the same thing - as king Canute famously showed.

 

[Oerdin]

Nope, they do want free trade but you can shove the rest. Which is all the UK ever wanted anyway.

Show me someone who claims free trade cannot happen without political union and I will show you either a fool or a liar. Free trade just means free trade and nothing else.