Listening to the excellent @RestIsPolitics @RoryStewartUK @campbellclaret on the Begum case has brought home to me just how much confusion there is about the deprivation of citizenship power. Here are 7 important facts about the power, starting with some common misconceptions :… (1) Deprivation of citizenship (DoC) is not the same as withdrawal of a passport, it is more fundamental, preventing people not just from travelling but having a right to live in the UK, benefiting from rights dependent on citizenship and from the protection of the UK Gov.

Anyone who thought that UK constitutional law had moved beyond the era of statues being disapplied for conflict with EU law, and the whole Factortame issue was confined to legal history, was wrong. This week the High Court (NI) disapplied 10 sections of an Act passed last year … No disapplication of an Act on this scale occurred during our membership of the EU. The case is Dillon & Ors [2024] NIKB 111 a brief explainer of a behemoth of a judgment:

The Safety of Rwanda Bill basically does, or would do, one thing only. Large parts of the Bill are belts and braces, surplusage or political rhetoric that shouldn’t be there. The one thing the Bill would do is to prevent domestic courts stopping transfers on the basis of a risk that asylum seekers will be wrongly returned to their home state by Rwandan officials (refoulement)

So, what about the Supreme Court’s Rwanda ruling? What next?

First, the ruling.

The SC delivered an emphatic decision that UK asylum seekers sent to Rwanda will face a real risk of being sent back to their countries of origin. Given that roughly 70pc of asylum seekers, including boat arrivals, are found to be genuine refugees, that means a lot of people would face a real risk of being sent to a country from which they have fled persecution, death, torture and/or serious mistreatment.

Should the UK withdraw from the ECHR? Lawyers are well placed to identify some of the consequences of membership and of leaving but ultimately it’s a political question. Not, though, a very difficult one IMO. In this thread I’ll focus on the current preoccupation: returning asylum seekers or non-nationals to their home country or sending them to third countries like Rwanda.

The duty of candour (DoC) is the obligation on parties to judicial review to be forthcoming with relevant information. In this characteristically pithy and quotable passage Fordham J draws the principles together, but there’s a problem …

https://twitter.com/finishedloading/status/1684260899949772823

The DoC is founded on the principle that the parties do not give disclosure in JR so the parties are obliged to bring key information to the Court’s attention in evidence. It compensates for the absence of disclosure …

A constitutional issue of real contemporary interest concerning the right to protest ignited last week in an unexpected place— a report of the HL secondary legislation scrutiny committee. In a blazing report (by usual standards), the committee drew the attention of the HL to draft regs increasing police powers over protest and lowering the threshold of ‘serious disruption’ which replicated proposed amendments to the PO Act 2023 that the HL had rejected in Jan.

How is that Conservative party members get to choose the next PM? Is it constitutionally appropriate? The rules and practices relating to how a PM is chosen during a parliamentary term without a general election are part of the ‘unwritten’ constitution. As in many contexts however the rules are in fact mostly written down, just not in something called the constitution.

The Pannick/Pobjoy opinion has brought the summer slumber of legal twitter to an abrupt end and divided opinion. A lot of very good commentary has already been generated in past 24 hrs. There’s also been a tendency towards people coming out ,all for’ or ‘all against’ the opinion. Leaving aside the particular inquiry into the PM, the debate draws attention to a more general - and highly topical - issue about the standards to be observed by select committees (SCs).

A collection of resignation statements.

Sept 2020, Lord Keen, Advocate General for Scotland, resigns over Gov breach of international law: He was responsible for marshalling the Internal Markets Bill through the Lords but could not find any respectable legal arguments to defend its departure from UK obligations under international law:

Ministers such as the Chancellor who receive a FPN, if they accept it, are likely in breach of the Ministerial Code, which requires that they comply with the law 1/… That doesn’t mean dismissal follows, although one might think committing a significant public health offence in a pandemic might ordinarily entail such consequences (Cf the various resignations for breaching lockdown rules inc Matt Hancock), it’s ultimately up to the PM 2/…

Can you appeal Covid FPN fines? Common sense says yes, surely you can - they could have significant consequences and some are very large -but the answer is in fact no. 1/ …

https://twitter.com/tomrhickman/status/1513847033571991565

The Gov never included an appeal provision. When people tried to challenge them by judicial review they were met with the response that they were essentially unreviewable and if you didn’t accept them you could defend yourself in the mags 2/…

The Judicial Review and Courts Bill has been greeted with sighs of relief. Even called a damp squib.

It certainly doesn’t significantly restrict judicial review, as many feared.

But it is wrong to think that it is just a tweak to the law on quashing orders.

Why ? … Because it would transfer significant power to judges including the power in effect to rewrite primarily legislation. …

1/ Did the Government have a policy of achieving herd immunity? Why did it not lockdown sooner?

Having spent quite some time writing and about and litigating Covid law and policy over the past yr here is a summary of my conclusions (similar to @PaulNuki thread linked below)

https://twitter.com/PaulNuki/status/1396899870921957383

2/ Up until the imposition of the lockdown on 23 March 20 the Gov was closely following the UK flu pandemic preparedness strategy (FPPS) which was based on similar assumptions to the known facts about the Covid outbreak, eg, a reasonable worst case of up to 2.5% mortality:

Three (ish) thoughts on the IRAL Report today and the new gov consultation that has been announced at the same time. 1st, the bottom line is that the Gov asked the IRAL if changes should be made to JR in a number of respects, the answer was (minor exceptions aside) a resounding ‘no’.

A brief explainer on the exercise/recreation distinction. The March lockdown restricted leaving home to ‘exercise’, which was then overplayed with ‘once per day’ guidance (law in Wales). Michael Gove added this should be a 30m jog, 45m ride, 1 hr walk politicshome.com/news/article/m… There was no ‘local’ restriction on where you took exercise the law in England (cf Wales). Derbyshire police provoked criticism in using drones to shame non local walkers. L. Sumption warning of a ‘police state’: google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.…

Much attention has been focused on the social distancing regulations and what they do and don’t say. But the second limb of the rules to reduce the spread of C19 - the self-isolation rules - have received less attention. This thread reflects on the self-isolation rules./... As with the social distancing rules, there is a mix of criminal law and guidance. The criminal law rules require a person to self-isolate if they have received a positive test, or been notified by PHE or local authority (not the App) of close contact with a positive case./...

From today the criminal law imposes the "rule of 6" on everbody in society. Some initial thoughts on the problematic nature and context of this rule and why it needs to be given very close scrutiny in Parliament and a better solution found [Thread] Let's start with the fact that - rightly or wrongly - we are at a point where many people in society will have understandable questions as to the attitude they are supposed to adopt to compliance with such regulations. Why? First, consider the messages:

The resignation of Sir Jonathan Jones raises questions such as: ‘How sure does a Government lawyer have to be before advising that proposed conduct will be unlawful?’ And: ‘how certain does it have to be that conduct will be unlawful before a Minister should not proceed?’ An answer is to be found in the government policy on legal risk which applies to both domestic and international law. Released under FOIA in 2018.

A thread on the gov panel set up to reform judicial power to review gov action in the UK, details of which here: gov.uk/government/new… FIRST: context. In its Manifesto the Gov promised a Constitution, Democracy and Rights Commission to look at how our institutions operate and ‘restore trust’. It’s remit included:

A long thread on the making of today’s face covering regulations and some reflections on coronavirus law-making in general. Consider this timeline: 13 July: Gov announces face masks are to be required in shops.