Brexit: the Case for a Parliamentary Vote – Jolyon Maugham QC

[The following was commissioned by Counsel Magazine and is also published here.]

I’ll take some things as read.

You’ll know there’s a legal challenge to the Government’s position that it is for it and not Parliament to decide what action to take following the result of the Referendum. And that the challenge will be heard in the Divisional Court in October with a likely leapfrog appeal to the Supreme Court in December.

You’ll be aware that the challenge raises a question about the nature of the limits to the Royal Prerogative. Will triggering Article 50 denude the European Communities Act 1972 of content? Will it deprive UK nationals of their rights as an EU citizen? Is it Theresa May’s finger on the trigger? Or is must it be by Act of Parliament?

Published alongside this piece is another arguing that these are political questions – and that the courts…