Article 50

Isabel Hardman is joined by Fraser Nelson and James Forsyth to discuss the ruling: In the past few minutes, the Supreme Court has delivered its ruling in the Article 50 case on taking Britain out of the European Union. The Government has lost. It had argued that it did not need an Act of Parliament before triggering the mechanism. The Court ruled by eight judges to three that the Government did need the authority of Parliament in order to start the process. You can read the full judgement here. But the Court also ruled unanimously that Brexit is a matter for the Westminster parliament and not the devolved assemblies. This means

Jeremy Corbyn is a famous rebel, so famous that when he was elected, many in his party wondered how he might tell MPs to vote the way he wanted them to when he himself had refused to listen to the whips throughout his backbench career. When he was still a backbencher, he enjoyed telling a tale about Sadiq Khan, then his whip, ringing him up to check he would definitely be rebelling on a certain vote, and not bothering to waste his energy trying to get him to abstain instead. Now the Labour leader is faced with one of those awkward moments that involve him telling his MPs to vote

The Supreme Court’s landmark case on triggering Article 50 has now finished. We’ll have to wait until January to hear the verdict of the 11 judges involved. But for now you can follow all the main events as they unfolded on our Spectator live blog: 4.20pm: It’s all over at the Supreme Court. Lord Neuberger rounds off proceedings by making it clear that the judges are ‘not being asked to overturn the referendum’. Before his comments, Eadie attempted to knock down Pannick’s view that the 2015 referendum act had political, rather than legal, significance. Not so, said Eadie, who insisted that the Government thought the act ‘speaks volumes about the

461 MPs have just voted for Theresa May to invoke Article 50 by the end of March. The Tory amendment to Labour’s opposition day motion passed comfortably with only 89 MPs opposing it—and Ken Clarke the only Tory amongst them with 20-odd Labour Mps joining the SNP and the Lib Dems in voting against. Now, this vote is not binding and if the government loses its appeal to the Supreme Court will not be sufficient to satisfy the courts. But it does indicate that the government will be able to get an Article 50 bill through the Commons without too much trouble. It does make you wonder why Theresa May

The second day of the Supreme Court hearing has seen the Government continue to put forward its case for why it should be allowed to pull the Article 50 trigger without the say so of Parliament. And Lord Pannick has been arguing why Parliament must give approval for the start of the process of Brexit. Here’s how the day unfolded on our Spectator live blog: 4.30pm: Pannick’s main pitch is about the power of Parliament. He tells the Supreme Court that ‘Parliament is sovereign and only Parliament can remove that which it has incorporated into domestic law’ – meaning that Brexit cannot be started by the Government without the agreement of Parliament. He

Today’s Supreme Court hearing did, for once, live up to its billing as being a ‘landmark case’. The court’s 11 judges – sitting together for the first time – will hear four days of evidence before ruling next month on the government’s appeal against the decision that Parliament must be given a say on triggering Article 50. Here’s the full coverage from today’s Supreme Court case: 4.30pm: Eadie finishes off his argument with a simple point. He urges the Supreme Court judges to measure their decision based on a test of asking the ‘man in the street’. Would the average person think that the referendum outcome gave the Government the right to kick start

A rare event at PMQs as Jeremy Corbyn went on the economy. The Labour leader had some well-crafted questions but rather spoiled things by confusing the IMF and the IFS, enabling Theresa May to declare that it is a good job she stands at the government despatch box and he sits on the opposition front bench. May gave little away, as is her wont, but Corbyn again went on social care — which is, obviously, an area where Labour think they can make political advances. A couple of Tory Eurosceptics asked May about reciprocal rights for UK and EU citizens respectively and the refusal of the EU to engage on

If there were any doubt that there are too many lawyers in Parliament it has been removed by the meeting, on Monday evening, between backbench Conservative MPs and the justice secretary Liz Truss. The subject was Truss’s alleged failure to defend the judiciary from criticism of last week’s High Court judgement on the enactment of Article 50. One MP was reported as saying: ‘Her job is to defend the judiciary from attack.’ No it isn’t. Liz Truss has special duties as Lord Chancellor – but she is the government’s justice secretary, not CEO of a judges’ trade association. Her duty as Lord Chancellor is to uphold the continued independence (from

David Davis tried to reassure Tory MPs that last week’s court ruling — and the forthcoming supreme court appeal — would not delay the government invoking Article 50, in a Commons statement this afternoon. The Brexit secretary re-stated Theresa May’s words that the government values the independence of the judiciary and the freedom of the press. He insisted that, despite the appeal, May still plans to trigger Article 50 by the end of March. The subsequent debate, however, made clear just how much division there is on the issue — as Davis accused those MPs demanding control over Brexit of wanting to ‘wreck the negotiation’. Anna Soubry’s call for ‘temperate’