A curious view, given the absence of any fundamental changes in the last 20 or so years to the way the British state is constituted that could plausibly affect its legitimacy.

Isn't 'a negative liberty to assisted suicide' a contradiction in terms?

Curious (to put it kindly) to suggest that there is something morally wrong with an MP seeking to solicit and represent the views of those who elected him.

The fame of this argument doesn't make up for its glaring weaknesses.

To a Brit, it's remarkable that US Presidential Pardons are seemingly subject to no legal checks. Were a UK Home Secretary, exercising the prerogative of mercy on the Crown's behalf, to pardon one of their close relatives (or themselves!) it would be quashed on judicial review.

Always love this quiet week before Christmas, getting some good writing done in my office in the beautiful Will’s Building ⁦⁦Bristol Law School⁩

Just for balance, I did Latin O level (yes, that long ago:)) at my state school in NE England and cordially detested it, despite my dear Mum specially making up a Latin card game (you had to collected all the cases and tenses of well known words) & assiduously playing it with me)

There's a respectable case for keeping an unelected Lords but with comprehensive reform of the appointments system. If we are serious about the Lords as a chamber for relatively non-partisan, expert scrutiny, we can no longer tolerate appointments by the partisan head of Govt.

If you’re a journalist covering the calls for a public inquiry into grooming gangs and you aren’t asking those making these calls about this - iicsa.org.uk Then you aren’t really worthy of the title.

Please join us! Book launch event (Bristol/online) for Known Unknowns, looking at intractable factual uncertainty across private law, historically and comparatively. 13 Feb, 5-7pm GMT; signup via Eventbrite: eventbrite.co.uk/e/1106423846509

Congratulations to my colleague Robert Craig for his richly-deserved promotion to Senior Lecturer! (He's being all modest about announcing it). And look out for his bold and original monograph on the prerogative, in press, out mid-May bloomsbury.com/uk/royal-law-9… Bristol Law School

A great illustration of why a legal power for the executive to suspend the legislature at pleasure has no place in a modern democracy. Since Miller II in the UK and its fall into disuse in New Zealand, Canada may be the only major democracy that maintains this absurd power.

The families at least obviously have such a right: it's known as 'freedom of speech'.

'Russia has always been the only friend of Europe' (aside from the little matter of having colonised Eastern Europe and divvied up Poland with Nazi Germany).

Strongly agree. And this not a partisan point for me, it's a constitutional one: it shows why the power of political prorogation (being able to suspend the legislature for a substantial period, for political gain) should have no place in a modern democracy.

If there is any government statement proposing to criminalise uttering speech that would be Islamophobic under this definition, can you please point us to it? Having an official definition of something in no way equates to criminalising it.