IDS highlights his own stupidity in discussion of Supreme Court’s ruling

Last Updated: January 24, 2017By

Of course you don’t need the Secret Barrister to tell you Iain Duncan Smith is a waste of space whose ideas are dangerous to the people of the UK – you know he was Work and Pensions Secretary for nearly six years, responsible for thousands of deaths (although yet to be punished for them).

The Huffington Post provides a commentary on the situation here – I mention it because I took the image (above) from the Twitter link.

I was drawn in by the following tweet, detailing what Mr Duncan Smith said in an interview after the Supreme Court’s Brexit ruling:

I responded:

For those who don’t know, our system in the UK relies on the separation of powers between the legislature (Parliament), the executive (the government of the day) and the judiciary (the courts).

Parliament has a legally unchallengeable right to make whatever laws it thinks right. The executive carries on the administration of the country in accordance with the powers conferred on it by law. The courts interpret the laws and see that they are obeyed.

The Supreme Court, today, conferred its judgement on a legal challenge to the plans of the government. While the court judged, the laws on which it based its judgement were passed by Parliament – and the government must obey the will of Parliament, for the reason stated above: its administration of the country is “in accordance with the powers conferred on it by law”.

So Mr Duncan Smith’s comments are drivel. Nobody suggested that the Supreme Court has primacy over Parliament because it was interpreting the will of Parliament in accordance with its duty.

The Supreme Court is not self-appointed. It was established by Parliament by section 23 of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005. Mr Duncan Smith may well have voted on the legislation himself.

Split judgements in Supreme Court cases are commonplace.

The court did not tell Parliament how to run its business – indeed, it relied on Parliamentary decisions to inform its own. Instead it reminded the government that its power to act unilaterally is limited; the law, made by Parliament and legally unchallengeable, means it must bring any decision on leaving the EU back to Parliament.

There are, therefore, no constitutional issues. The Supreme Court was acting entirely within its rights.

And Iain Duncan Smith is an idiot, along with anybody who agrees with him on this.

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9 Comments

  1. Di ane January 24, 2017 at 3:41 pm - Reply

    No offense: but when doesn’t IDS show his utter stupidity.

    • Mike Sivier January 25, 2017 at 1:19 am - Reply

      None taken; I agree with your remark.

    • Justin January 25, 2017 at 1:14 pm - Reply

      when he does not talk, this thing is a danger to spoken language, they should have a permanent naughty chair in parliament reserved for idiots like him,better still just get rid of him

  2. NMac January 24, 2017 at 4:00 pm - Reply

    Duncan-Smith was a third-rate individual, who even the nasty party couldn’t stomach as its ‘leader’. he was soon dumped. I could never understand how he was allowed to make a third-rate, but extremely nasty and vindictive, comeback. Possibly it may be due to money and donations to the nasty party coffers.

    • Justin January 25, 2017 at 1:21 pm - Reply

      He is not a third rate individual, he is in a class of his own, the most hated mp in the whole of the tory party, someone must love him, somehow they keep voting for him, he should have been sacked and he still has questions to answer as far as i am concerned about the amount of suicides his policies have caused and his policies (tory) will continue to cause, this thing is a danger to public and needs to be sectioned under a s136 order only permanently

  3. Martin January 24, 2017 at 6:01 pm - Reply

    So IDS is basically complaining that the supreme court shouldn’t have ruled that parliament should be given a say in respect to how the country leaves the EU, while previously claiming that one of the main reasons he wants the UK to leave the EU is to make parliament sovereign as far as legislation goes. This isn’t the intellectual clarity you would expect from an alumnus of the ancient University of Perugia in Italy is it? Poor old duffer.

    • Justin January 25, 2017 at 2:01 pm - Reply

      Not forgetting his excellent army career, a bag carrier, I doubt if someone like him could pass basic fitness, still the army must have been desperate in those days, they advertised, got people in and then they had ids, even the drill sergeant probably gave up in frustration, he probably did well in the end, the amount of punishment press up’s private smith must have done would have been a record breaker, somehow this useless waste of space managed to convince someone he was something, one thing is for sure, he is not fooling nobody, a horrid person who needs to be held to account along with the rest of his entourage

  4. Barry Davies January 24, 2017 at 11:31 pm - Reply

    The issue of who has supremacy over the law is muddied by this case even being heard, if parliament has supremacy and it should have then the court should not be able to tell it that it has to use a speck route when there is another one constitutionally available. As I see it the response form the judicary has failed to take reality into consideration, not uncommon with the supreme court these days, which is until we invoke article 50 we can not negotiate with the eu, so to say we have to put the terms of leaving, to the parliament, prior to invoking article 50 is essentially impossible. Theresa May can still invoke article 50 she just needs to get the date set by parliament to do it, I would suggest march 28th.

    • Mike Sivier January 25, 2017 at 12:47 am - Reply

      You misunderstand the law. The Supreme Court did not tell Parliament to do anything; it confirmed that Parliament has sovereignty in this – as in all UK legal matters (it always has) – and reminded Mrs May’s government of the legally-required course of action.
      You also misunderstand – or misrepresent, I should say – what the Article 50 legislation should do.
      It amazes me that you have tried to correct people who clearly understand the situation better than you. Why would you want to put yourself at the same level of idiocy as Iain Duncan Smith? (Rhetorical; don’t bother answering.)

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