Net-net, this means, imho, that the prorogation continues and that parliament will meet on the 15th of October
I stick by my opinion that Brexit is nearly 100% certain and no-deal Brexit on October 31, 2019 is nearly 95% certain.
Posted on 09/12/2019 6:07:21 AM PDT by Cronos
Legal challenges to a no-deal Brexit centre on political matters which must be kept outside judicial examination, the High Court in Belfast has ruled.
A senior judge has rejected all grounds of challenge to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's strategy for taking the UK out of the EU, including claims that it would threaten the Northern Ireland peace process.
Lord Justice Bernard McCloskey delivered his ruling on Thursday morning.
Dismissing cases brought by victims campaigner Raymond McCord and two other applicants, Lord Justice McCloskey held that they were non justiciable.
According to his determination the actions indisputably focused on political issues, and targeting unpredictable and rapidly evolving government policy at national and international levels.
"Within the world of politics the well recognised phenomena of claim and counter-claim, assertion and counter-assertion, allegation and denial, blow and counter-blow, alternation and modification of government policy, public statements, unpublished deliberations, posturing, strategy and tactics are the very essence of what is both countenanced and permitted in a democratic society," he said.
Lord Justice McCloskey declared, "Considered in their totality (the applicants challenges) point inexorably to the conclusion that these cases trespass upon the prohibited domain of the non-justiciable.
"They qualify to be dismissed on this ground alone."
His decision underpins a verdict reached by senior English judges in a separate challenge over Mr Johnson's decision to suspend parliament for five weeks ahead of the October 31 Brexit deadline.
But with a Scottish court ruling that the Prime Minister acted unlawfully over the prorogation move, the Supreme Court in London will sit next week to clarify the legal position.
Meanwhile, Mr McCord pledged to seek an urgent appeal in his failed bid to secure a judicial review.
He insisted that his claims about the legality of the parliamentary shutdown was not dealt with at the case heard in Belfast.
The campaigner - whose son was murdered by loyalist paramilitaries in 1997 - said, "I am determined to take my case to the Supreme Court.
"Northern Ireland's voice must be heard at the highest court in the land because Brexit is going to affect us worse than the rest of the UK.
"As well as the potential return to violence we are now seeing reports about the impact on business.
"The chaos being predicted is going to hit everybody, not just the people who voted to remain."
In his case Mr McCord alleged that a no-deal Brexit will plunge Northern Ireland into turmoil and economic misery.
According to his legal team the government are unlawfully trying to quit the EU without an agreement at any costs.
They claim that such a departure breaches the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 which safeguards the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. Counsel for the Prime Minister and UK government argued, however, that the courts should not even be dealing with issues of foreign affairs and international relations.
It was also contended that Brexit laws impose no obligation on the UK to negotiate a withdrawal agreement with the EU.
Backing the government position, Lord Justice McCloskey said: "Virtually all of the assembled evidence belongs in the world of politics, both national and supranational."
Net-net, this means, imho, that the prorogation continues and that parliament will meet on the 15th of October
I stick by my opinion that Brexit is nearly 100% certain and no-deal Brexit on October 31, 2019 is nearly 95% certain.
Good post. Thanks.
Thought I couldn’t understand the British accent, but I can’t even understand their writing.
I also thought that Ireland was united as one.
Much appreciate your post. Always helpful to have more info to help navigate Brexit.
Ireland hasn’t been united as one for a long, long time.
In 1920 the Republic of Ireland got independence from the British Empire, but the north-eastern portion remained in the UK as Northern Ireland.
The RoI was very poor and very dependent on the UK until the 1980s.
As an aside many of the leaders of the Irish independence movement and also the first President of Ireland, were Protestants. So it’s not really a religious question, more an ethnic one - those who felt “Irish” support(ed) independence and those who felt “British” support(ed) the union.
the Republic of Ireland joined the EC (the precursor to the EU in 1973.
the UK in the 1950s was a member of the EFTA - the European Free trade association - with the Scandinavian countries. But it’s economy was tanking and by 1965 was the sick man of europe - lagging behind even Italy.
The EC was formed in the 1950s as well as a union with the explicit statement of “ever closer political union” - of France, Italy, Germany and the low-land countries. They formed the European court of justice and devised the 4 freedoms: freedom of people to move across borders - so borderless by the 1960s
The UK then asked to join the EU and were rejected twice by de Gaulle. After de Gaulle died, they then joined in 1973 with the republic of Ireland.
In 1997 the Republic of Ireland and the UK were both members of the EU and signed the good friday agreement with open borders or rather no border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of ireland - so everyone was happy.
But now Brexit leave wants to have closed borders which contradicts the open Irish border. So a stalemate.
Good decision.
Some of our judicial decisions could learn from this.
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