Original post by Sademajekwhat mark would you give this?
The British constitution has become increasinglycodified, discuss. A constitution is a set of rules that defines themanner a country is run. The British constitution is said to be an unwrittenconstitution, more accurately it is uncodified as much more of the British constitution is written down, however, theyare not all written down in a single document like a codified constitutionwould require as how the US is, however draws from several different sourcessuch as; statutes laws, common law, conventions, EU laws, authoritativedocuments etc. Statute law, is a written law passed down by parliament forexample the human rights act of 1998 which brought the European convention onhuman rights into British law, conventions is another source of the Britishconstitution, they are unwritten laws considered binding on members of thepolitical community for example the Salisbury convention which made sure thatthe house of lords does not obstruct proposals contained in the governmentsmost recent manifesto. Has the British constitution become increasinglycodified? Its not the case that the British constitution is being written in asingle document but in fact that more of the constitution is being written downas there is increasingly more written statutes that have great constitutionalimpacts as they are passed by parliament making them more rigid therefore harder to change as parliament has ultimatesovereignty, however you could say the EU laws are exempt from this, thesignificant examples of statute law with great constitutional impacts are suchas the TheHuman Rights Act [1998]which was put inplace under Tony Blair, the Human Rights Act enshrined into constitutional lawbasic human rights that appear as articles of the European Convention of HumanRights, However does allow for changes to be made by the government to theseterms. The Act's terms include: Article 2 (Right to Life), a citizen's right tolife is protected by law. No citizen can be deprived of their lifeintentionally, except in the case of serving a criminal sentence. Article6 (Fair Trial), all citizens are to be tried fairly and equally in a court oflaw, and are presumed innocent until proven guilty. Article12 (Marriage and Family), all men and women have the right to marry and start afamily. Anotherexample that could be used is Devolution for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as much of it hasthe character of fundamental law, it has limited the powers of Westminster itcontributes to the case that the British constitution has becomemore codified in the sense that it is more rigid and hard to change because itis derived through referendums, defying this means that the government is againstthe wish of the people. Another statute that supports that indeed theBritish constitution is becoming more codified is the 2005 constitutionalreform act which separate the judiciary form the executive and legislature bycreating a supreme court court which more adopts the idea of separate powersmostly found n codified constitutions like the US for example , it also tookover the judicial work of the house of lords, establishing the judicialappointments commission. The prospect of a coalition government in 2010 opensup the discussion even more as it led to the coalition agreement for stabilityand reform and called for constitutional clarification by the cabinet secretary,which demonstrates that indeed the constitution is becoming more codified asthere was a need for ‘clarification’ which without a doubt a codifiedconstitution does establish. Authoritative documentation has undoubtedlybeen imbedded into the constitution for example the ministerial code firstpublished as questions of procedure for ministers in 1992, and now as a set of‘rules’ for ministers. The cabinet manual also demonstrates hugely the changeof the British constitutions as traditions are being replaced as it set out howthe government and civil service relate to the monarchy, devolvedadministrations and international institutions such as the EU. In conclusion there is no doubt that theBritish constitution is becoming more codified not in the sense that everythingis written down on piece of authoritative document making it highly entrenchedbut in the sense that there is a growing body of codified statute la, that aremaking the constitution more rigid, however it is still a far cry from a completecodified constitution as laws and be flexibly changed by the sovereignty ofparliament just needing a majority.