English law
[9][d] Although Scotland and Northern Ireland form part of the United Kingdom and share Westminster as a primary legislature, they have separate legal systems outside English law.
[17] The neo-Gothic Royal Courts of Justice in The Strand, London, were built shortly afterwards to celebrate these reforms.
Formerly, most civil actions claiming damages in the High Court were commenced by obtaining a writ issued in the Queen's name.
[21] After the Woolf Reforms of 1999, almost all civil actions other than those connected with insolvency are commenced by the completion of a Claim Form [22] as opposed to a writ, originating application, or a summons.
Secondary (or "delegated") legislation in England includes: Statutes are cited in this fashion: "Short Title Year", e.g.
It denotes, in the first place, the Anglo-Norman legal system that superseded and replaced Anglo-Saxon law in England following the Battle of Hastings in 1066.
Throughout the Late Medieval Period, English law was codified through judge-made laws and precedents that were created in the proceedings of Royal justices in the Circuit courts dictated by the Eyres throughout the country (these themselves evolving from the early medieval Itinerant courts).
In other words, no comprehensive codification of the law has taken place and judicial precedents are binding as opposed to persuasive.
[30] In the early centuries of English common law, the justices and judges were responsible for adapting the system of writs to meet everyday needs, applying a mixture of precedent and common sense to build up a body of internally consistent law.
If a statute is ambiguous, then the courts have exclusive power to decide its true meaning, using the principles of statutory interpretation.
Since the courts have no authority to legislate, the "legal fiction" is that they "declare" (rather than "create") the common law.
The House of Lords took this "declaratory power" a stage further in DPP v Shaw,[31] where, in creating the new crime of "conspiracy to corrupt public morals", Viscount Simonds claimed the court had a "residual power to protect the moral welfare of the state".
[32][33] As Parliament became ever more established and influential, Parliamentary legislation gradually overtook judicial law-making, such that today's judges are able to innovate only in certain, very narrowly defined areas.
[34] After Britain's colonial period, jurisdictions that had inherited and adopted England's common law[p] developed their courts of final appeal in differing ways: jurisdictions still under the British crown are subject to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London.
[r] Even after independence, many former British colonies in the Commonwealth continued to use the Privy Council, as it offered a readily available high-grade service.
The English law of salvage,[36] collisions,[37] ship arrest,[38] and carriage of goods by sea[39] are subject to international conventions which Britain played a leading role in drafting.
Many of these conventions incorporate principles derived from English common law[w] and documentary procedures.
Although Scotland and Northern Ireland form part of the United Kingdom and share the Parliament at Westminster as the primary legislature, they have separate legal systems.
A major difference is use of the Welsh language, as laws concerning it apply in Wales and not in the rest of the United Kingdom.
