Over the
last few weeks, and especially the last couple of days in the wake of the
referendum, I have been hearing a lot about parliamentary sovereignty. First
the leavers were arguing that we needed to abandon the EU so that we could
restore parliamentary sovereignty, now some remainers are saying that
parliament should exercise its sovereignty to keep us in. Beyond a slogan
parliament sovereignty is the cornerstone, or perhaps even the entirety, of the
British constitution and I've been finding myself thinking a lot about this
terminally un-sexy subject as we move into probably the biggest constitutional
crisis the nation has faced in centuries.
The more
romantic among us tend to see parliamentary sovereignty beginning with Magna Carta,
but it only asserted itself in its modern form after the glorious revolution. The
standard telling of glorious revolution is as the time we invited the Dutch
king to become our king as well to keep the Catholics out of power, which is
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| The Bill of Rights - 1689 |
partially true (the Dutch didn't have a king for one thing) but misses the
important point that the revolution was in fact an end to a period political
chaos which has engulfed the British isles since the start of the civil war
over 40 years earlier.
The
conflicts that beset Britain
and Ireland
during the 17th century were many-fold; religious, economic, political, and
many others beside. Over this period the country had experienced despotism and
tyranny that led to nepotism, corruption, and popular discontent, and (for the
time) unbridled democracy that had bred anarchy, religious extremism, and
ultimately military dictatorship. The glorious revolution ended this period
with a compromise between the two conflicting ideals of how to distribute power.
No one individual would be able to rule, but neither would the people be given
too much power. Instead absolute power would be passed to the many headed instruction
of parliament.
In
vesting sovereignty in parliament Britain had eschewed both monarchy
and democracy, and in essence become a republic or "commonwealth"
again, with some major tweeks from the commonwealth that had briefly existed
during the civil wars, and without the actual name to avoid upsetting anyone's
sensibilities. Neither the word republic nor commonwealth imply democracy,
instead the words imply common ownership and common duty. Indeed it would be
hard to describe Britain
as democratic in any meaningful way until at most the middle of the nineteenth
century, and possible not even today.
Our
constitution means that we elect several hundred minor dictators in the hopes
that they will act in our best interest, and a few years later we get to remove
them if we feel they have failed or are getting a bit to big for their boots.
It isn't a perfect system of running things, but it works as long as they
remember their duty as best summed up by the words of the philosopher and MP Edmund Burke:
"Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment;
and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your
opinion."
and in return for serving us,
we get to kick him out of a job if he sacrifices too much or not enough. The
crux of the constitution is that the citizens aren't in charge on any day but
election day, for the duration of a parliament it is the MPs who have the final
say no matter what we may think and we are simply parliament's subjects.
So what are we to do about
our EU referendum? We have had referenda before but the government has either
been clear that they are purely advisory, or set quorums and targets to limit
the power we are granted. With this referendum it has been made clear that it
was binding and that all that was required a simple majority. Now it has occurred
all but a few MPs have been explicit in agreeing to its terms.
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JMW Turner - The Burning of the
Houses of Lords and Commons |
In this referendum the people
have been given unbridled power and parliament has shirked its constitutional
duty, its very raison d'être: to limit the impulses of the people and provide
sober reflection and judgement on complex issues that an ordinary person has
neither the time nor often the inclination for. To quote Burke again:
" If the local constituent should have an interest, or
should form an hasty opinion, evidently opposite to the real good of the rest
of the community, the member [of parliament] for that place ought to be as far, as any
other, from any endeavour to give it effect."
The consequences of this
dereliction of duty on the part of our MPs are becoming more obvious daily, the
economy is at risk, the unity of the British nation is crumbling, and many
people are regretting the way they have voted because they could not possibly
hope to inform themselves of all the possible outcomes.
Although I support remain I
honestly do not feel that parliament can go back on this referendum. Out of
fear of the people and naked ambition they have opened Pandora's box and in
doing so they may have destroyed both our nation and its constitution. Britain has
never been as conservative as its stereotype suggests, it has always been a
country bursting with radical ideas and riven by deep seated divisions. For
better or worse these forces have been unleashed, it is impossible to say what
the outcome will be.
