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Assess The Role Of Separation Of Powers In The Uk

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The separation of powers refers to the three main bodies of the UK government; the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. Each body is supposed to hold a separate function. The legislature can also be referred to as parliament who makes the laws, the executive (government) put these laws into action whilst the judiciary also known as the courts uphold and interpret these laws. To ensure that powers do not overlap between the three, they’re divided. This corresponds with Montesquieu’s argument that all states need these three separate functions to prevent too much power in one place of the doctrine and so power can not be abused. The UK does not have a written constitution like the vast majority of countries and so there is no formal separation however, many factors have developed this doctrine in the UK. For example, the Constitutional Reform act 2005 played a big role to put these separations into existence, with one of the key features being the opening of the Supreme Court. Likewise, …show more content…
Or, to prevent one party from being in power for too long. However, it would also be wrong to suggest that parliament allows its MP’s to get away with criminal offences by relying on Bills that protect them. For example, in R v Chaytor the MP’s could not challenge the police with Article 9 Bill of Rights as they had committed fraud and so, parliament themselves invited the police to investigate suggesting that they do not abuse their powers. Nevertheless, it can always be argued back that the final say in court is usually in parliaments favour, suggesting that Lord Phillips is completely wrong to suggest a clear separation of powers within the constitution as certain powers can still cause the system to be ‘unfair’ or ‘biased’ to an

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