Between and local authorities and social workers had the opportunity to adjust their practices so that when the Children Act became law in they would be able to put the Act into practice. We invite you to discuss this subject, but remember this is a public forum.
Please be polite, and avoid your passions turning into contempt for others. We may delete posts that are rude or aggressive, or edit posts containing contact details or links to other websites.
If you enjoyed this, why not follow a feed to find out when we have new things like it? Choose an RSS feed from the list below. Don't know what to do with RSS feeds? Remember, you can also make your own, personal feed by combining tags from around OpenLearn. For further information, take a look at our frequently asked questions which may give you the support you need.
Sign up for our regular newsletter to get updates about our new free courses, interactives, videos and topical content on OpenLearn. Newsletter sign-up. OpenLearn works with other organisations by providing free courses and resources that support our mission of opening up educational opportunities to more people in more places.
All rights reserved. The Open University is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority in relation to its secondary activity of credit broking. Skip to content Study with The Open University. Search for free courses, interactives, videos and more!
Free Learning from The Open University. Featured content. Free courses. After the Governor General has signified assent to the bills, the Speaker and members of the House of Commons withdraw from the Senate Chamber. The Governor General then leaves. The Speaker of the Senate returns to the chair, the mace is returned to the table and the sitting of the Senate resumes.
If the business of the Senate has been completed for the day, the Senate adjourns. As with a traditional Royal Assent ceremony, it is the government that decides when Royal Assent by written declaration will take place.
If the Governor General is available, the written declaration will typically occur at Rideau Hall. The procedure can, however, take place at an alternate location. In addition, if a supply bill is to be given Royal Assent, a table officer from the House of Commons is present. The Royal Assent Act also allows for the attendance of interested parliamentarians. During a written declaration of Royal Assent, the Clerk of the Parliaments, with the parchments of the bills in hand, announces the titles of the bills awaiting assent.
If there are any supply bills to receive Royal Assent, it is the table officer from the House of Commons who presents these bills to the Governor General. After the bills have been presented, the Governor General signs a declaration of Royal Assent, which is witnessed by the Clerk of the Parliaments as to the date, time and place. After the written declaration procedure is complete, the Secretary to the Governor General provides a letter to the Speakers of the Senate and House of Commons formally advising them that Royal Assent has been signified to the bills listed in the schedule to the letter.
These letters are then delivered to the two Speakers. The Speakers read the letter in their respective chamber to notify their members that Royal Assent has been granted to certain bills. Royal Assent is only deemed to have been granted to a bill after both chambers have been notified. The proffering of ministerial advice may in some kinds of cases be permissible. It has been made in various cases elsewhere in the Commonwealth and in some places is explicitly incorporated into the legislative process.
In the UK, however, the Monarch is not bound to accept that advice. It is a separate question, in fact, and not explored seriously here, whether in circumstances such as the present, it would be unreasonable and hence unlawful for ministers to advise the Queen to withhold consent. To do so would draw her into a political dispute, it would imply wrongly that she is bound to follow ministerial advice, and it would lead to a constitutional change in the settled practice being led not only without parliamentary support as is required in the Miller case but exactly contrary to the expressed wishes of the two Houses of Parliament.
In my view, furthermore, ministerial advice forms no part of the legislative process in the UK and hence is not protected from judicial scrutiny by Article 9 of the Bill of Rights Whether any legal dispute arising under these or other terms would be regarded as justiciable by the courts is yet a further matter, also for another day — one that hopefully never comes.
Suggested citation: J. Blog 5th Apr. Both of these Acts require Assent to be given by letters patent under the Great Seal. That means that at least one government minister takes personal responsibility for the Queen giving Royal Assent on each and every occasion. An interesting point. Certainly the Clerk of the Crown has dual loyalties as both a servant of the Crown in ancient office and permanent secretary to the Lord Chancellor in the Ministry of Justice.
No doubt Secretaries of State and HM Treasury do not customarily involve themselves in Royal Assent formalities, though the Secretary of State has pre-eminence in treaty-making and other prerogatives. Whether the Lord Chancellor is actively involved in seeking Royal Assent is a question of custom and modern practice which could of course be answered by the government. The implication is that, by virtue of prior custom and the saved effect of the Royal Assent by Commission Act s.
None of which is conclusive but may be suggestive that neither The Queen nor the Clerk of the Crown look to ministers for advice on Royal Assent, though no doubt timing and coordination are matters on which government and parliamentary clerks routinely but informally liaise. Thank you for your post. I think you are probably right that Royal Assent passes the Great Seal under the proviso to section 2 1 of the Act.
These are single documents. The Queen signs the Commission itself. Commissions are submitted direct to The Queen by the Lord Chancellor. This effectively restates the point I was making. An individual Minister is taking responsibility for each grant of Royal Assent. Thank you, Gary, for the further procedural information. So the Lord Chancellor does have a customary direct albeit informal role. It remains unclear what happens if the Lord Chancellor is out of town, but the ordinary practice evidently provides a determined Lord Chancellor with means to subvert Assent — unless the Clerk pre-emptively subverts by writing directly!
It does not purport to change anything about the circumstances in which a government or prime minister is required to resign. The Act merely provides that if a motion of no confidence is passed using certain specific wording then there must be a general election unless, within 14 days, a motion of confidence is passed.
Beyond that the Act is entirely silent on the subject of confidence motions, prime ministerial resignations, and government formation. And there is no express provision in the Act that would abolish the longstanding convention that a government defeat on the budget or another major government policy is equivalent to a vote of no confidence.
I would also disagree with that proposition, but the point is open to debate. I set out my own views on this topic in a post published in […]. In his blog post above, Professor Jeff King has responded to two recent posts I have written on this blog, the first on royal assent and the second on the distinction between responsible and representative government.
This post specifically denies this claim to the extent that it suggests I misread or misrepresented Twomeys view. Her thorough and fair exposition of the arguments of both sides allows for alternative readings of her views on the current law. Twomey has confirmed to me in correspondence that she thinks both interpretations by me and King may be viewed as correct.
This is because she has a policy of scrupulously setting out both sides for the reader to draw their own conclusions. Those conclusions may differ. She makes clear that there is no blanket or automatic rule that the Queen must always grant assent and she cites examples in her book of circumstances when assent may be denied or delayed.
She also made clear that her personal view is that in the particular extraordinary circumstances we face, advice to refuse assent should not be given because questions of confidence would arise and the Queen would be placed in an invidious position.
Of course, she could not possibly have been expected to predict this particular scenario in her book and she makes clear that she did not express her own view in the book. However, I did not claim Twomey agreed with my views on responsible government in my second post. In fact I did not mention Twomey at all in that post.
0コメント