Sources of Law in England and Wales Legal System

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Business Law
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11/7/2018

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Every nation has it is own law and legal system. In order to discuss the source of law, this is to
be stated that law is not developed overnight but it is a long process (Parliament.uk, 2018). Law
of every nation belongs to some sources where from the same gets it is identification and
validity. Similar to any other nation or states, the laws of England and Wales also have many of
the internal as well as external sources by the help of which the same came into it is present
form. In the presented essay, the discussion will be focused on various sources of law of England
and Wales legal system.
Firstly, to discuss the internal sources of law of England and Wales, this is to mention that these
are the sources that are related to the UK. On the other side, external sources of law are those,
which consist outside elements such as international law. Moving towards internal sources of law
of England and Wales legal system, this is to state that there are mainly four sources from which
the subjective law has been derived. These four sources are namely, statue law, the common law,
European Union Law and European Convention on Human Rights. Starting from a very first
source that is Statue law, this is to inform that statue law is also known as legislation. The most
significant piece of legislation is acts of parliament (Inbrief.co.uk, 2018). For both England as
well as Wales, the UK parliament has the power to pass laws. This parliament is based in
London. Legislation pass by this parliament is applicable to England and Wales and therefore
becomes an important source of law in the country of England and Wales. Legislations are the
written law that gets approval from parliament (Halberstam and Reimann, 2013). In England and
Wales, there were many legislations passed by UK parliament that the courts of these countries
were used to referred while granting decisions in the cases. The sovereign body of parliament
includes queen and two houses such as the House of Commons and House of Lords

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(Cilex.org.uk, 2018). These houses pass a legislation that applies to the England and Wales. The
assent of the queen is required to develop a bill into legislation. Judges often look up to the rules
of these legislations in order to provide justice to victim parties. It would not be wrongful to state
that this is a very important source of law that is helpful in the legal system of these two
countries. However, in England, the judges have powers to make interpretation of legislation and
to apply the same accordingly to various cases by using extrinsic and intrinsic aids. When it
comes to the discussion of statues as sources of law, this is to conclude that judges are very much
depended on the same and one cannot imagine a law of any nation without the existence and
reference of statues.
The other primary sources of law in these two countries are common law (Loc.gov, 2018).
Common law can be understood as customs and practices of a nation. The common law works
on the principle of an idol situation and refers to the historical origin of certain rules. In those
cases where an act is missing, judges provide a decision based on common law. Common law
and equity are closely connected. In England and Wales, modern law is not statutory in nature
and judges makes interpretation of the legislation. It provides that judges modify the acts
according to the nature of cases and use them as an equity principle and therefore the common
law is a very significant source of laws in England and Wales. English law is way much
dependent on common law. In English law, there was no major codification of law. In fact, the
judges were and are used to apply the decisions given by judges in earlier cases as a reference in
current cases. Legal precedents are part of common law in this way. Where one side, common
law consists the old practices, similarly on another side, legal precedents means the decisions of
old cases.