I agree with Bercow

Great. Let’s hope Farage does boycott the BBC. The less air time he gets the better.

Farage is throwing his toys out of the pram because he has been spoiled and indulged by the Brexit Broadcasting Corporation for the last twenty years and suddenly he was subjected to some serious questioning by Andrew Marr, who is probably the only member of the BBC politics team who is not a Tory brexiter - and Farage just couldn't cope. Didums!

David Allen Green
@davidallengreen

The most "centralising and undemocratic" force in UK at the moment is not the EU but the minority government of Johnson, shutting down parliament and seeking to get its way regardless of parliamentary and court defeats

This is why we need to strengthen our democracy

Nick Reeves #FinalSayForAll #FBPE

Farage vows to boycott the BBC after accusing it of treating him like a ‘war criminal.

Farage is showing his narcissistic intolerance of questioning. He has called to purge the Army & Civil Service of Remainers. It is clear that he would crush democracy.

Is just too much to want, desire and demand honourable politicians? We'll BJ,Grove and the rest of the Tory Party really now show that Honorable Members of Parliament cannot be relied upon to act honorably. So against my natural reaction, I think a written constitution, not based on adversarial politics or even adversarial courts, is now overdue

I agree Elegran a written constitution would have to be subject to review, we don't want to end up like the USA where amendment after amendment seems to be written in stone eg the right to bear arms which has been horribly misused.

It seems to me that 10 years ago, everyone except perhaps political historians naively thought that we could always rely on our leaders to honour the gentleman’s code.

But we were wrong

Over the past 10 years our politicians have not followed convention and they are beginning to push the boundaries ever wider without any agreement whatsoever.

Sadly a written convention is now required.

Or even of a written one.

No easy task, and likely to lead to conflict over exactly what the "Gentlemen's agreements" agreed to. That could be a good thing (once it is ironed out) but there is still the danger that in a century or so there will be new threats to be faced. Who could have imagined this threat a century ago?

Perhaps there should be some provision for an official review of a writen constitution at set intervals?

When I learned Constitutional Law, I was taught that it was an ancient system of conventions, not codified, like European ones. When we dissolved the Empire all the new countries got written constitutions.

The difference, so we were told, was that the British constitution had evolved over a thousand years to be run by 'Gentlemen', who were honourable and trustworthy. They knew the rules of fair play and would always choose naturally to do whatever was the best thing for the nation.

Our lot may be expensively educated, but it seems they are not 'Gentlemen'. So it doesn't work. Do we hope for better in future, or is it time to set about writing a new constitution? (No easy task.)

The problem at the moment is, as several commentators have noted, that Parliament depends on 'gentleman's agreement' and a concept of 'honour' implicit in that. This has more or less held until now but over the past 3 years we have seen our government ministers failing to observe the convention of honourable behaviour and in doing so they have discovered that there is little comeback involved. Cummings is exploiting this to the nth degree.

We have an entirely Alice Through the Looking Glass situation where some constitutional lawyers (and possibly the judiciary, though that remains to be seen) argue that the Executive cannot be legally held to account and that it is up to Parliament, (the Legislature) to remedy what they see to be an abuse of power themselves. But Parliament cannot act swiftly to remedy it because it has been prorogued.

The whole principle of Parliamentary Sovereignty rests on the Legislature being able to curb the power of the Crown (represented by the Executive government), a principle established over the years since the English Civil War. As Elegran points out, we lose that at our peril.

Many people don't like the way it has been used in this case There was no need to prorogue Parliamentfor so long, if at all, in the ordinary way of things - it has been done purely to prevent the Government coming under the scrutiny of Parliament until only two weeks remain before Brexit-under-any-circumstances comes into effect (ie - who cares what deal we can get, even if it is none?). These are the very circumstances where ALL contributions to the subject should be heard and discussed.

There are checks and balances on the use and abuse of power in this democracy. Closing down one of those checks in favour of one man's unilateral actions sets a precedent for it to be done whenever a would-be despot wants to take an unopposed action.

If the next example were for someone to make himself the sole lawmaker of the country, it would be easier for him because of the precedent. Those in favour of this arbitrary and strangely timed proroguing are turkeys voting for /christmas.

John Major used it to deflect attention from the cash for questions scandal.

Not routinely ( nobody said it had) but it’s a tool available to PM’s at times.John Major used it.

Only people who head studied history had even heard of prorogation before this, so I think the talk of it being routine is disingenuous, in the same way as all the other soundbites- after hearing the same thing over and over, people will come to accept it as truth. Parliament has not been routinely prorogued to prevent debate.

I firmly believe that we need a written constitution, but worry that after Brexit it will be too late.

Sounds like a bad idea to me.
Our Parliament has run well the way it is for a long, long time.
Proroguing Parliament has been used before by PM’s so why should it now be deemed unlawful? Because some people don’t like it? If the Supreme Court don’t accept it was done lawfully then they will say so.
No need for a written constitution all of a sudden.
Needless to say, Jonathan Freeland is a keen Remainer who would like nothing better than to scupper Brexit.

Sounds like a good idea, if something positive comes out of this , then that has to be a good thing IMO.