Who Makes The Laws Of This Country, Parliament Or The Judges?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-accuses-judges-of-making-britain-more-dangerous-by-not-deporting-more-foreign-criminals-8498374.html

[Kathyan]

Parliament make the laws, judges interpret them!

[rojash]

Home secretaries most definitely don't, that's for sure.

[anotheoldgit]

Kathyan

/// Parliament make the laws, judges interpret them! ///

Then it would seem that they are either written wrongly or the Judges miss-interpret them.

[DSJ]

The judiciary ignores them!

[FredPuli43]

aog, the general rule is that politicians don't know, or affect not to know, the law. They then make great statements,whenever they want a headline, saying that the judges aren't applying the law. That's easier, and less embarrassing, than accepting that the law is inadequate, or that officials employed by the government aren't enforcing it.

[Milvus]

Both make law. Judges make common law, Parliament makes Statuary Law and can amend common law. Murder for instance is common law.
Statuary law takes precedence where, in a case, both can apply

[atalanta]

The former House of Lords, now the Supreme Court, can make law. If they decide on a point of law which has not been decided before, it becomes law. It is called Case Law. It can be overturned by Parliament, but only if a new law is passed.

[New Judge]

Mrs May should be careful.

Successive governments in the UK have chosen to overlook the fact that the articles within the ECHR and the clauses in our own Human Rights Act (which is more or less a direct lift off of the ECHR) are extremely wooly and have been interpreted by judges in an increasingly broad sense, some would say perniciously.

As the law stands the judges are interpreting it as they think fit. If the government is unhappy with this (as many of the electorate seem to be) then they need to repeal the 1998 Act and withdraw from the ECHR (doing the first will serve no purpose without the second). In my view there is no need for either in the UK. The principle beneficiaries of the legislation are foreigners, criminals, foreign criminals and a number of other groups who seek to use the legislation to circumvent the laws to which the rest of the population are subject. Further, I don’t know of any cases involving UK citizens where their rights have been transgressed and where redress was not available under other UK domestic law.

If Mrs May is concerned about foreign criminals being allowed to remain in the UK after release from prison the answer lies in her government’s hands and she should stop bleating on about it.

[IggyB]

As said both groups define the laws of this county. Wiki has a short introduction here http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_law

It is a strong legal system and has been exported all over the place. Its another example of why we should all be proud to be British.

[ludwig]

Some judges seem to make a deliberate point of ruling contrary to the spirit of the law, if the letter of it is ambiguous enough to let them do so.

On the one hand this is annoying to government and public alike, but on the other it's a signal to do things properly and get rid of the ambiguity.

[FredPuli43]

Can anyone explain how the Human Rights Act changed anything in the existing common law or statutory rights of anyone in this country ?

[Dodger666]

"Who Makes The Laws Of This Country"

The UK Government does, provided it's OK with Brussels. :)

[Zeuhl]

Well for a start, Theresa May isn't Parliament

She's just another 'here today gone tomorrow' self serving politician

[sandyRoe]

Is there any known case where a claim to a family life here in the UK by a criminal facing deportation was rejected?

[pdq1]

When it comes to immigrants it seems the law is completely useless and our governments are equally to blame for not rewriting the statute book. When it comes to fighting in another country we can blow them to smithereens but can't lay a finger on the ones here.

[emmie]

good one in today's paper, A Nigerian who was kicked out in 2005 for using a forged stamp in his passport which allowed him to work. he was allowed back on a marriage visa after marrying a British nurse. He had been caught out along with other Nigerian nationals in a lottery scam, laundering some of the money they received through three of his accounts. So far so bad, because of his marital status he will be allowed to stay once his sentence is up. Two years jail, less some time off for good behaviour or however it works these days, and back on our streets, great. If Mrs May wanted to actually do something constructive she should resign.

[New Judge]

Just a quick point of clarification concerning “early release” for em10 and others:

For determinate sentences release at the half-way point is automatic and unconditional. The remainder of the sentence is performed “on licence” but note that for those sentenced to short terms (12 months or less) there is now no provision for recall if further offences are committed whilst “on licence”.

As I said in an answer to another question, fred, I believe the ECHR and the 1998 HR Act bestowed no additional genuine “Human Rights” on people in the UK that were not adequately provided under the protection of other legislation. What they have done is provide the facilities, for example, for convicted criminals to claim the right to “a family life” [in the UK] thus preventing them being deported. Prior to this Parliament had decreed that it was in the public’s best interests that their safety and security were enhanced by removing foreign criminals from the UK. Now HR legislation (as enhanced by judges and unchecked by Parliament) means that the so-called right to a family life routinely trumps the right to safety in their beds for the law-abiding majority.

[FredPuli43]

Right to family life shouldn't trump anything. I'm pretty sure that nowhere in the law does it say that it is a paramount consideration, but merely a factor in the general justice and fairness in deporting somebody, a factor to be taken into account in deciding whether ,exceptionally, the person be not deported. Before all this specifying of matters to be considered, it was still considered as part of the general picture, we just didn't name it as a separate ground in its own right.

[emmie]

would be hilarious if this undesirable got to stay by way of a sham marriage, but who's laughing...

[New Judge]

Yes I quite agree, fred. But the problem is these decisions seem not to be made on an exceptional basis but seem to be routine. Every judicial decision must accord with Human Rights legislation and rights that are not absolute (such as Article 8) can (and should) be balanced against other factors. But this does not seem to be the case at all. I also agree that nowhere in the law does it say that "Right to Family Life" is a paramount consideration. But the problem with HR legislation is that it says nothing specific at all and relies on individual interpretation by judges in almost every case.

There is no doubt in my mind that in the recent past judges have been making a disproportionately high number of decisions in favour of those claiming the right to family life.