The Importance Of Parliamentary Sovereignty

Parliament sovereignty means that the Parliament’s power is unlimited and it can make law on any subject matter. No one can limit the law - making power of any future Parliament. It is impossible therefore for any Parliament to pass a permanent law or in other words to entrench an Act of Parliament. According to Dicey, parliamentary sovereignty means that Parliament has the “right to make or unmake ay law whatever”. This basically mean that there is no limit on the subject matter on which Parliament may legislate. Sovereignty should be clearly differentiated and distinguished. It is divided into legal sovereignty as well as political sovereignty. Legal sovereignty is concerned with the legal relationship between the courts and Parliament.

In a nutshell, parliamentary sovereignty exists because judges have for centuries consistently stated that they do not have the constitutional power to question Acts of Parliament. They have come to the conclusion that the judicial function is merely to interpret legislation in order to ascertain the intention of Parliament in passing it. The case Cheney v Conn gives an outline of this point. Due to the courts accepting judgments of the Queen in Parliament and allowing any law to be passed for centuries, parliamentary sovereignty is a known as a common law doctrine. Sovereignty is a fundamental rule of the common law. The sovereignty is not laid down in any statute. For as long as the judges accept the sovereignty of Parliament, sovereignty will remain the ultimate rule of constitution. As Salmond explains, all rules of law have historical sources. As a matter of fact and history they have their origin somewhere, though we may not know what it is. But not all of them have legal sources. Bu whence comes the rule that Acts of Parliament have the force of law? This legally ultimate, its source is historically only not legal. It is the law because it the law and not for any other reason that it is possible for the law to take notice of. No statute can confer this power upon Parliament for this would be to assume and act on the very power that is to be

Firstly, if the Parliament itself decides to abolish its sovereignty and to use a written constitution instead to be adjudicated upon by the judiciary. Besides that, if the judiciary itself decides to accept that the Parliament is no longer the sovereign law making body. In any constitution, written or unwritten there must be a source of ultimate authority, one supreme power over all and above all other powers in the state. In the case when a state has a written constitution, the highest source of power is the constitution interpreted by the Supreme Court. The United Kingdom does not have a written or codified constitution. Thus, parliamentary sovereignty is the central element of the British constitution. The highest source of authority is the United Kingdom Parliament and Acts of Parliament are the highest form of