Section 3 of that act specifically requires you to take this kind of thing to the ECJ if the matter is as you've portrayed it.
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Section 3 of that act specifically requires you to take this kind of thing to the ECJ if the matter is as you've portrayed it.
This is not an ECJ matter. ECHR != ECJ just as Council of Europe != EU.
It really isn't.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
If some mobster forged an alliance with the BNP and seized control of the your country by violence with the criminal class, racist thugs, and soccer hooligans, and cowed the rest of the population, his actions in the same space will be just as much an exercise in UK sovereignty as Parliaments, despite only having a year or two of history and not being elected. Legitmacy and sovereignty are not linked. At all. Legitimacy is just a way to maintain the explicit and implicit consent of the governed, the same way the naked use of force and coercion is.Quote:
because we chose to make Parliament sovereign over many centuries because we elect it, it has the powers it has due to democracy.
You apparently don't understand the background and principles involved. As evidence by the fact that you went right back to using sovereignty and "parliamentary sovereignty"/legislative supremacy side-by-side. Parliament exercises the sovereginty of the UK in its present structure. It is not unique or special in this regard, no different from the US federal government, the French National Assembly and Government, Putin in Russia, or the junta ruling Myanmar. Parliamentary supremacy means nothing more than that it is the final word and authority in your governmental structure. Federal supremacy provides the US government the same thing (but is more diffuse by being deliberately divided into competing sources of federal power). Your parliamentary sovereignty is singled out primarily by resting entirely in one governmental body, your legislature. Pure legislative supremacy is comparatively unusual.
And the thing is, this isn't a side-track. It's your half of what I referred to earlier in you and Hazir insisting on deliberately talking past each other and acknowledging that your positions are primarily as matter of deliberately chosen perspective, looking at the topic from one specific context and ignoring other relevant contexts which still make up the whole.
Not sure why you thought it was a suggestion the UK was unique. I explicitly made comparisons to the US.
As for your straw man "what ifs" well if a junta took over then things would be different, but then we would use different terminologies anyway. However out current sovereignty is given to those we elect so that is an exercise in democracy, even if your fictional alternatives are not.
I don't know about the intentional part, but otherwise your question is valid.Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
I still find it stupefying to encounter middle school national mythology as someone's absolute truth.
Whereas your primary school international mythology is superior?
I must have missed something. The OP questioned legal precedents, and legislative authorities, right? :confused:
I have no idea what's going on with Elton John and his spouse in English courts.....but what I do know is that Hulk Hogan's lawsuit against Gawker was funded by a billionaire PayPal founder. I'm surprised when people act surprised that for-profit lawyers influence legislation.
There was nothing straw man about it. It's not a "what if", it's an illustrative example of how sovereignty has jack-all to do with democracy. You keep conflating sovereignty and parliamentary supremacy, they're not the same thing at all. Sovereignty applies to the country, and while yes, it does involve the consent of the governed, that consent doesn't have to be explicitly expressed and can even be out and out coerced. All that you need for soveriegnty is the acknowledgement of the people being acted on behalf of, and of other countries, that yes you are acting in their name and on their behalf, even if they don't like it and don't want it. Active resistance interferes with sovereignty, but it's the only thing that does. And we wouldn't be using different terminology for these illustrative examples. Myanmar is a sovereign state even though it is controlled by an unelected junta, and that junta most certainly is speaking for the people of the country, even the dissenters. There is no difference between their sovereignty, your sovereignty, or that of Nicaragua or Ghana. Your state is sovereign. Your parliament is not. It's just the body which stands at the top of the hierarchies in your state when it comes to exercising that sovereignty in your governmental system. Parliamentary sovereignty is a bad term because it has nothing to do with sovereignty and that's why everyone else doesn't use it, we use the term parliamentary supremacy (or legislative supremacy if we're talking about a similar/identical body that uses a different label than "parliament").Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Gosh, I wish you'd posted that synopsis before I started a thread on national vs global governance. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
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Originally Posted by GGT
Don't worry about it, I remember that no one paid the slightest attention to that thread of yours.
Hey, Fuzzy....when have you ever started a thread? Don't worry about it, some people just can't ask questions or pose dilemmas for debate and discussion. :donkey:Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
Very rarely. And yes, some people just can't do it. You for instance. I elect not to do it, whereas you try and constantly fail.Quote:
Originally Posted by GGT
But I try. Even if I fail, at least I've tried. You don't even try, so stop acting like your smug superiority is a good thing. :bored:Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
I'm not the one who decided to make an irrelevant interjection to try and start something. If I had wanted to participate in that pointless thread of yours, even if I had talked about sovereignty, you wouldn't have understood it and wouldn't be interested in understanding it, preferring to march on with whatever deliberately myopic opinions and perspective you'd settled on when you started the thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by GGT
You are using an artificially restrictive definition that does not match the meaning ascribed to it by the likes of John Stuart Mill and others.Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
Even then you are failing to come to the conclusion of your own definition. "All that you need for soveriegnty is the acknowledgement of the people being acted on behalf of, and of other countries, that yes you are acting in their name and on their behalf, even if they don't like it and don't want it." Does Parliament have the acknowledgement of British subjects and other countries, that yes they are acting in our name and on our behalf even if we don't like it or don't want it? Yes.
You're ignoring the first part of what I said, the section right before what you quoted. "Sovereignty applies to the country." Parliament, a dictator, a theocratic authority, they are the instruments by which it is expressed. I don't give a rat's ass how JSM loosely described it several centuries ago (and frankly, if you wanted a philosopher from the Age of Enlightment to describe it, you'd be better off looking to Rousseau. He's the one who actually spoke on point wrt the idea you're trying to express), we're talking about law and contemporary national and international systems here.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
It has nothing to do with you being a democracy, nor does it have anything to do with your misleadingly phrased "parliamentary sovereignty."
You are creating a tautology. You are insisting that sovereignty applies to the country simply because you define it as applying to the country.
That doesn't even make sense because actually as everyone else has already pointed out the EU as an international organisation has some sovereignty despite not being a country. So your definition does not work in the real world.
Incidentally I picked JSM precisely because he didn't simply agree with what I was saying, but was giving another interpretation. But then I'm not the one trying to create artificial restrictions.
To an extent I am, because possessing soveriegnty is pretty much the gold standard for whether an entity is actually a country or not. Countries which can't maintain internal sovereignty are the definition of failed states. Here's the thing. Definitions are frequently tautological. They're allowed to be, they're not logic exercises.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Does it have sovereignty though? This whole thread is because you are misusing your term. You are applying to another context altogether (one which might be common English, particularly UK English, even if it doesn't mesh with the technical term), one where it's just a synonym for terms like supremacy, and then conflating it with the one which actually applies here, the authority of a state to govern itself which is how it is used in legal theory. Legal theory provides the controlling usage since we're talking about jurisprudence. Maybe I was wrong earlier when I said that both you and Hazir were being deliberate in your behavior. Maybe you really are Lewkish yourself and just can't recognize context or the possibility of multiple perspectives/usages which don't conform to your colloquial ones.Quote:
That doesn't even make sense because actually as everyone else has already pointed out the EU as an international organisation has some sovereignty despite not being a country. So your definition does not work in the real world.
I don't rule out the possibility of multiple usages, you are insisting your definition is the only one. That is despite my definition not only being in common usage but the actual definition.
While your definition exists it is not the only definition. Indeed it isn't even the PRIMARY definition. Parliament meets the definition of both sovereign (it is "a group or body of persons or a state having sovereign authority") and having sovereignty (it meets both definitions 1 and 3). While your definition is there too as number 5. I don't deny your definition exists, but mine does too. So you are being Lewkish if you refuse to accept other technical definitions and insist on your own usage.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dictionary
I didn't say it was the only one, I said it was the relevant one, the one that applies to the context of this topic, the requirements of the ECHR on privacy protection through the jurisprudence of court rulings interpreting governmental acts. Which has not one goddamn bit to do with whether the acts in question arise from a democratic body or from Ghengis Khan.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
And you were wrong. The rulings were made by a British court based on a British law. The European Court of Human Rights has not entered into the debate at all. If the democratically elected and sovereign British Parliament wants to exercise it's sovereign authority to change the law then the British courts would have to respect that. And no external court would have entered the debate still though at that point the individual I'm banned by an inane court case from naming could appeal to the ECHR though since the ECHR is categorically NOT sovereign over British laws even if he won his case we would have to consider whether we wanted to change the law (a la prisoners votes). The ECHR is not a Supreme Court and does not get the final say.
Well pardon me for being confused by some guy who started in this thread by entering the ECHR into the debate..Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
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Originally Posted by RandBlade
Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
The problem is the "overvigorous interpretations" as I said, not the Court or the Convention which have never ruled this way.
Hence why the article can be published in Scotland but not England, let alone the fact it cal also be published in the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Germany or anywhere else for that matter. ONLY England and Wales have this issue, so it is for our Parliament to clean up our own mess. Until 1997 the ECHR was not part of English law, we can clear it up by repealing or amending that Act and making it clearer that free speech is protected. Though we don't even need to go that far, a simple Act explicitly instructing the right to free speech takes priority would suffice even if the ECHR were kept word for word in English law ... indeed even if the Court were to in future rule this wrong way.
Again the same rubbish about the Convention not being English law prior to your parliament copying it into formal national legislation.
By the act of ratification the Convention became British law, that means it also was and is the law of the land in England. There is little wrong with the Convention nor in its application at large. What is problematic is that in England you try to apply the same rules in a different way than is the general norm. It's a senseless approach of the matter untill you revoke your ratification. Your parliament can not undo the obligations under the Convention by any material legislation on human rights.
As for the matter at hand; I can not see the Court in Strassbourg ruling in favour of injunctions pertaining to repress what is already common knowledge. The British state would have to prove that this bridle on the free press is necessary rather than ridiculous.
The hell if I can find coverage about this outside of the UK ironically...so looks like reports of an affair can't be discussed?
Probably it's because nobody gives a hoot about this couple's sex life and the English discussing the fact they can't talk about it without disregarding rulings forbidding them to do so.
There is nothing senseless about interpreting laws in our own way Hazir, that is what sovereign nations do. I couldn't care less if you interpet something different to us.
The EU has not itself acceded to the ECHR but it has enshrined those rights in its own laws and where British laws or their implementation may conflict with those EU laws you are obligated by your own laws to refer the matter to the ECJ if there is any uncertainty as to what the EU law is. If the EU law is clear and British law is in conflict, then you are, by your own laws, required to disapply the conflicting British statutes. Once the EU accedes to the ECHR you may be forced to refer this sort of thing to the ECtHR I guess.
The above applies if this is best characterized as a problem resulting from incorrect or overzealous interpretation of either the ECHR or the EU charter of Fundamental Rights. Even if this is instead characterized as being a problem with British law only, if your highest court rules in a way that conflicts with EU law it may be appropriate to take this higher up to the EU level, however it's possible that you may avoid that by having your parliament change the law before that happens.
Something that strikes me as a little funny is that the aforementioned European Communities Act of 1972 and its subsequent application in effect gives the EU supremacy over British laws, rather than Parliament. Even with parliamentary sovereignty, you would have to repeal that act in order to implement laws that conflict with EU laws. Parliamentary sovereignty also does not free you from your various treaty obligations.
Again the EU is not a party to this dispute and lacks standing here. The ECtHR is not an EU body, it is a Council of Europe one. Even if we vote to Leave the EU on June 23 we would (unless decided separately) remain an ECHR signatory like such famous European democracies Russia, Turkey, Ukraine and Azerbaijan.
The 1972 Act gives the EU (and the ECJ) supremacy over British laws by virtue of the powers it is given by Parliament, in theory Parliament can repeal that at any time. The ECtHR has no such supremacy - and the EU one is restricted to those areas that are under the areas granted to the EU as its powers, which it isn't certain whether this would be or not.
As for Parliamentary sovereignty, of course it doesn't free you from treaty obligations. But it is possible to deliberately violate your treaty obligations. If Parliament passes a law that explicitly contradicts an earlier Treaty then domestically the law stands as the new law supercedes the prior Treaty. Treaties do not override subsequent laws that deliberately and explicitly contradict them. Internationally that may not be popular with our partners but that doesn't change matters. This may not be the case in all nations, but is in ours and is in others too (for instance I believe the US Federal government - but not State governments). Incidentally in theory we could if we wanted Remain in the EU and explicitly override EU supremacy by passing a law to do so, repealing or amending the 1972 Act. That would cause a headache in international relations but as far as domestic courts are concerned what Parliament decreed would be the law. I am not for an instant suggesting we do that, just that it is theoretically possible though it would be a terrible idea.
@LF; I give up.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Rand, just because the British parliament has the legal right (domestically) to violate its international obligations doesn't mean it's a good idea to do so (as you yourself acknowledge). That means that it's stupid for the British parliament to pay a high cost by violating its international obligations when this case can be appealed cost-free higher up the European legal system.
There is no international obligation to appeal this higher up the system.
If Parliament were to direct the courts within our own system to apply the law properly then that doesn't affect our international obligations one jot. Especially considering Parliament would be directing the courts to interpret the law the same as our international partners do. Whereas if we appeal but lose the appeal then we are caught in a quandary of either violating our international obligations or accepting a bad ruling. Why go for the nuclear option first?
The logical answer to me to a mess you have made yourself is to clean it up yourself. The alternative should be a last resort.
Saw a discussion elsewhere that was pertinent to this discussion. Turns out that it isn't only the UK and USA that views its international obligations through domestic laws first and foremost.
The highest part of international law is surely the UNSCR, with virtually all nations (including all EU states) subject to the UN. Yet the ECJ has decreed that it can override the implementation of UNSC resolutions: https://www.asil.org/insights/volume...-court-justice
I have no theoretical problem with this, though given that the ECJ is no more a nation than the UNSC is, it should be up to member nations to determine which if either gets precedence.
Er, I'm pretty sure that ruling doesn't say what you think it says.
So did the court defer to the ruling by the higher up body or did it just make its own unilateral decision?
It said that the process used was wrong, that carrying out such UNSC resolutions like that has to go through the courts, not just legislatures or ministries.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Yep, it ruled well within its jurisdiction. Funnily enough I think you could easily use this ruling as an example as to why re-legislating by lower levels of government is not desirable.Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
Next up: Rand tries to explain to us that it's perfectly okay for the UK to reinstate torture as a truth-finding medium in court and also the burning of witches.
Because they're a "sovereign nation".
Nevermind any contracts said sovereign nation signed willingly.
If the UK wants to do that then that's possible yes.
I don't want the UK to do that but any sovereign nation can do what it pleases ultimately, "contracts" are absolutely and entirely meaningless if a country decides to revoke them. We had a contract with your nation that you wouldn't invade Poland but did that stop you? When push came to shove what use were the Munich Agreement or the League of Nations?
You may wish to be a modern-day Chamberlain shouting how you 'have in my hand a piece of paper ...' but I would rather have more credible eternal vigilence based in the sovereign systems we have evolved over a thousand years to prevent abuses rather than some figleaf that isn't even a century old that could easily be overturned.
In the same way that your contract with your employer is meaningless: your employer can't physically compel you to work, but they can sure as hell ruin your reputation and finances.