2019 United Kingdom prorogation controversy

[4][notes 1] It is distinct from adjournment and recess, which are short breaks that do not halt all parliamentary business, and dissolution, which disperses Parliament in advance of a general election.

Stephen Harper, the prime minister and leader of the minority Conservative government, advised the governor general, Michaëlle Jean, to prorogue Parliament prior to the budget.

The prime minister, Gough Whitlam, was controversially dismissed by the governor-general, John Kerr, and replaced by the leader of the Opposition, Malcolm Fraser, who commanded a majority in the Senate.

The House of Representatives, controlled by the Australian Labor Party, passed a motion of no confidence in Fraser, but was unable to reinstall Whitlam before Kerr dissolved Parliament in advance of a federal election.

At the time, the parliamentary session had been ongoing since 13 June 2017, several days after a general election which saw the governing Conservative Party, then led by Theresa May, lose its majority.

After the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011—which abrogated the similar royal power to dissolve Parliament—passed into law, the regular start of the parliamentary calendar moved to coincide with elections in May.

Proponents of leaving the European Union without a deal suggested prorogation as a method to ensure such a departure; the United Kingdom's withdrawal remains the legal default with or without a negotiated withdrawal agreement, and the prorogation of Parliament would prevent legislation to either ratify the agreement, seek an extension to Brexit negotiations, or revoke the invocation of Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union.

After persistent rumours of this course of action, despite Parliament's explicit rejection of a "no-deal" scenario, opposition MPs took control of the legislative calendar and passed the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2019, also known as the "Cooper–Letwin Bill", which mandated the Government to seek a longer extension to Brexit negotiations.

[16] As part of his strategy to ensure, "do or die", the UK's withdrawal from the EU on 31 October 2019, Johnson's campaign team and political commentators saw prorogation as a viable method to effect the policy.

[17] On 18 July, Johnson's imminent victory led opposition MPs to successfully amend the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Bill to make prorogation during late October functionally impossible; the Act requires the Government to lay reports before Parliament, which would then sit to debate them even during the body's suspension.

[22] In the week ending 24 August 2019, it was reported that within the previous 10 days Johnson had asked the attorney general, Geoffrey Cox, for legal advice on the matter of prorogation, tentatively scheduled for between the return of Parliament on 3 September and the European Council meeting on 17 October.

[25] Opposition politicians stated their opposition to prorogation: First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon (SNP) described Johnson's actions as like a "tin-pot dictator",[26] First Minister of Wales Mark Drakeford (Labour) said Johnson wanted to "close the doors" on democracy[27] and Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson called prorogation a "dangerous and unacceptable course of action".

Conservative chairman James Cleverly described the prorogation of Parliament followed by a Queen's Speech as something "all new governments do",[28] President of the United States Donald Trump expressed his support for Johnson, via Twitter, and former First Minister of Northern Ireland Arlene Foster (DUP) welcomed prorogation as an opportunity to review and renegotiate the confidence and supply agreement her party entered into with the Government.

[29] Within hours of the announcement, impromptu protests took place in major cities; a demonstration to "stop the coup" outside Parliament claimed an attendance of several thousand.

[30] Upon Parliament's return on 3 September 2019, Conservative MP and "no-deal" opponent Oliver Letwin made an emergency motion to introduce a bill which sought to delay Brexit past 31 October.

Letwin was successful due to the rebellion of 21 Conservative MPs who were subsequently suspended from the party; coupled with the defection of Phillip Lee to the Liberal Democrats, Johnson lost his working majority on his second day in Parliament as prime minister.

[39] The procedures for prorogation occurred shortly before 2 am local time on 10 September 2019,[40] when Sarah Clarke, Lady Usher of the Black Rod, entered the Commons chamber to signal the start of the formal ceremony amidst shouts of protest from the opposition benches.

[41] Bercow, who was then surrounded by opposition MPs who held makeshift signs that read "silenced",[40] said that the intended prorogation "represents not just in the minds of many colleagues, but to huge numbers of people outside, an act of executive fiat" before he departed to the House of Lords for the ceremony.

[20] Immediately after the announcement of prorogation on 28 August, Cherry applied to the court for an interim interdict to prevent prorogation until the case could be heard;[45] on the same day, Gina Miller, who previously defeated the Government on the use of the royal prerogative in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, made an urgent application for judicial review of the use of prerogative powers at the High Court of Justice for England and Wales in London,[46] and victims' rights activist Raymond McCord made an application at the High Court of Northern Ireland in Belfast which alleged breaches of the Good Friday Agreement.

The statement evoked the "Enemies of the People" newspaper headline after the government lost the 2016 Miller case, and the subsequent controversy over then-Lord Chancellor Liz Truss's apparent failure to defend the independence of the judiciary.

[56] In response, incumbent Lord Chancellor Robert Buckland QC—who several days previously met Johnson to encourage him to not breach the Article 50 extension law—responded in defence of the judiciary, and the Prime Minister's Office made a subsequent statement which defended the impartiality of the judges.

[59] Refusal to conform with a humble address, which is binding, risks the Government being found in contempt of Parliament for the second time within a year;[59] in the first instance, Parliament voted in December 2018 that legal professional privilege was not a defence to a charge of contempt, in relation to the Government's initial refusal to disclose the full legal advice it received on the withdrawal agreement.

[60] The partial release of the Yellowhammer documents, which detailed possible disruption to the supply of food, fuel, and medicine as a result of a no-deal Brexit, led to renewed calls from the opposition for Parliament on 12 September to be immediately recalled.

[67] Johnson, then a member of the opposition frontbench, was another high-profile supporter of the impeachment motion and wrote an opinion piece in The Daily Telegraph which accused Blair of "treating Parliament and the public with contempt".

[70] The final day of the hearing saw interventions from other interested parties: former solicitor general Lord Garnier, who responded for former prime minister John Major, argued prorogation was "motivated by a desire to prevent Parliament interfering with the prime minister's policies during that period"; the Scottish Government, who were represented by its Lord Advocate, James Wolffe, argued prorogation had a "profoundly intrusive effect" on Parliament; McCord's advocate Ronan Lavery QC argued prorogation was designed to "run down the clock" to force a no-deal Brexit, which would in turn result in controls on the border with Ireland; and in a written submission, the shadow attorney general, Shami Chakrabarti, said that if the power to prorogue was unchecked, Parliament would be "deprived" of the ability to "perform its constitutional function".

[75] The first item of debate was an urgent question by Cherry to the attorney general; she urged Cox to publish the legal advice he gave to Johnson on the subject of prorogation to avoid him being labelled as a scapegoat for the affair.

Cox defended the advice he gave to Johnson as being "in good faith", and distanced himself from comments from Conservative MPs which attacked the independence of the judiciary: specifically, Rees-Mogg's description of the ruling as a "constitutional coup".

[76] On the day of the ruling, Johnson was in New York City to give a speech before the United Nations General Assembly, tentatively scheduled for the morning on 25 September.

[82] On 26 September, Bercow made another statement from the chair that he was considering an application by Kenneth Clarke and Harriet Harman—the longest serving male and female MPs respectively—for a Speaker's Conference to be held to discuss the lack of decorum in contemporary British political culture.

[84] In an interview with the BBC, Johnson said he deplored any threats of violence, but defended his description of the Article 50 extension law as a "Surrender Bill" and declined requests to apologise.