Please have a read through the information provided below and answer the question with relevant reference.
Parliamentary Sovereignty is the method by which the British parliament can enact, or revoke, any new law it wishes; ultimately parliamentary sovereignty
is a principle of the UK constitution. It ensures that parliament is the overriding legal entity within the UK. (Parliament.UK, 2017) This meant that the
courts, including the high court, cannot question the validity of a law once introduced by parliament. (Macintyre, 2014) The Human Rights Act 1998 (HRA
1998) was designed to provide a heightened level of protection of individual human rights, without compromising the fundamental constitutional principle of
parliamentary sovereignty. (Young,2009)
When considering the effects of the HRA 1998 has on parliamentary sovereignty, it is important to understand that parliamentary sovereignty has been
eroded. For example, if parliament wanted to reintroduce a past statute, or introduce a new statute that would be in contravention of the HRA 1998, then
parliament could be overturned; this dilutes what parliamentary sovereignty was supposed to be. If one or more provisions of a passed statute, infringe the
human rights of a person or group of people, parliamentary sovereignty would be undermined by the HRA 1998, and would not have the ability be passed as
statute law. (Hoffman, Rowe, 2010)
On the above evidence, I feel that it has been substantiated that parliamentary sovereignty has been eroded by the HRA 1998, and the ability for the UK
parliament to be the supreme legal entity in the UK is questioned when human rights are contravened by a statute law being passed.
Does anyone else feel that the HRA has reduced the perception on how the UK parliament is perceived as a supreme legal entity within the UK?
