| Justice or Just Us? |
16 June 2003
|
Lord Chancellor's Job Abolished
The British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, MP, PC, has decided to reshuffle his cabinet, which is his right. In doing so, he has decided to abolish the office of Lord Chancellor. As much as it surprises, the Tory party of Great Britain was absolutely right to call it unconstitutional and wrong, the move of a dictator. The Right Honourable Mr. Blair did the right thing in the wrong way.
The job was begging for abolition on the grounds of the inherent conflicts of interest it possessed. The Lord Chancellor was in charge of the courts, head of the House of Lords and a cabinet minister. Critics of the 800-year-old arrangement include judges, constitutional reformers and the European Parliament. Instead, a Department of Constitutional Affairs will be created along with an independent supreme court.
Yet there was no consultation with Parliament, nor with the judiciary. As Lord Onslow put it, Mr. Blair's move was a "high-handed, almost Saddamesque way of treating the British constitution." Indeed.
The British constitution, the unwritten rules of the game, has needed major work since 1945, and Mr. Blair's government has been the most successful in fixing it (notably with the Welsh and Scottish assemblies). However, the right way to make the change is to introduce debate, legislate, and then, reform follows. The British system is self-correcting, to a large degree, and to side-step these mechanisms undermines the validity of the change.
Mr. Blair, one believed, was wiser than he has shown himself to be.