Editorial. By ruling Boris Johnson's decision to suspend the work of Parliament illegal, the United Kingdom Supreme Court has shown the resilience of British institutions, but no escape from the Brexit crisis is still in sight.
Editorial of the "World". In the endless but thrilling feuilleton of Brexit, the judgment rendered on Tuesday, September 24, by the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is not just another incident. By dismissing Prime Minister Boris Johnson's decision to interrupt the work of Parliament as illegal, null and void, the country's highest court has recalled two principles shaped by the age-old history of British democracy: the supremacy of Parliament whose sovereignty can not be weakened by the executive; the power of the deputies to control the acts of the executive in all circumstances.
In a country whose Constitution, unwritten, results largely from use and jurisprudence rooted in history, the rule that the king or queen "Has no rights apart from that which the law of the land gives him" four centuries later, Mr. Johnson can not place himself above the rule of law, rule of law so revered British.
Terrible dilemma in sight for the EU
The call to order by the eleven unanimous members of the Supreme Court sounds like the worst snub that a British prime minister can face. Normally, he should have resigned. Boris Johnson, who came to power at the end of July without being elected, not only flouted the sovereignty of Westminster, which he promised, like all Brexit supporters, to restore, against the encroachments of "Brussels," but he compromised the queen by advising her to endorse an illegal decision, which she could not refuse. In two months, the nationalist leader has stopped laughing: it has damaged the oldest democracy in the world, already shaken for three years by the Brexit. This is a warning for all democracies.
Once again, British institutions demonstrate their resilience and resilience in the storm. The serenity with which Brenda Hale, the presiding judge of the high court, has stated a judgment of a clinical precision, written in a way comprehensible by all, contrasts with the looks of crazy dog and the borborygmes of Mr. Johnson. Tribute must be paid to the two heroines of this dramatic act: Lady Hale, a septuagenarian who personifies the force of law, and Gina Miller, the courageous anti-Brexit businesswoman who, in the guilty silence of the Labor opposition , has seized justice.
If the institutions hold firm, the political chaos intensifies and no way out of the Brexit crisis is in sight. Boris Johnson is far from being on the ground. The anger of the population against a Parliament unable to reach a compromise on Brexit is so strong in the country that the strategy to play "the people" against deputies and judges "Saboteurs" and "Defeatists" for the upcoming elections, is paying off, as evidenced by polls favorable to the Prime Minister.
Back in session, the deputies will seek all means to force Boris Johnson to do what he has excluded a thousand times: seek a postponement of the deadline of Brexit, set by the EU to 31 October. Faced with Labor's refusal to go to the polls before the threat of a Brexit without agreement is dismissed, Johnson has no other way than to resign or to conclude an agreement with the EU. . Such unlikely assumptions that the Twenty-Seven may face a terrible dilemma: grant a new deadline without any guarantee of result, or expel the United Kingdom, as the country faces its worst crisis since the Second World War.