Thread by @JolyonMaugham

THREAD.

So under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, where there's an emergency, and various other preconditions are satisfied, regulations can be made by Her Majesty by an Order in Council.

And those regulations would in principle enable legislation, including the Benn Act, to be suspended.

Of course, there isn't an emergency, and those other preconditions aren't satisfied, and so there can't lawfully be a suspension of the Benn Act. But who cares right, because a lawful suspension isn't the strategy?

The strategy is, by hook or by crook, to delay the duty in the Benn Act to send an extension letter to the EU for long enough that the timetable for that extension to be agreed is compressed unmanageably.

And there's quite a lot to do in those eleven days from 20 to 31 October. The EU has to get the letter and consider whether they want to let the basket case that is the UK into the EU, and even if they do they might not agree to extend to the date the Benn Act prescribes and...

... if they want to extend to another date there's a procedure back here in Parliament and so on.

So any compression of the timetable might lead to the irreversible consequence of there being no time to finalise an extension.

And let's assume for the sake of argument that HM does what quite arguably she shouldn't when confronted with plainly unlawful advice that she make an Order in Council: she makes one anyway.

Well, some shmoe, actually quite a senior shmoe, has to make those regulations.

And that same schmoe has to state, and specify and declare a whole bunch of stuff which is just plainly untrue because, well, see above: there isn't an emergency and the conditions aren't satisfied.

But here's the thing. If the schmoe does all of this recklessly indifferent as to whether or not the stating and specifying and declaring is right, then said schmoe has a problem.

Because said schmoe would be guilty, I think anyway, of misconduct in public office. Which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Poor schmoe.

Anyway, over to you, @BorisJohnson. cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance…

Some suggestion that this thread might be wrong because Major talks of an Order OF Council rather than this power, made by an Order IN Council. But we can identify no power to suspend the Benn Act by Order OF Council, a thing usually used for trivialities (163 NLJ 321).