Sources of Law in England and Wales

This paper analyzes the legal system of the UK by looking at the main sources of the law, including parliamentary legislation, case-law, European Convention on Human Rights, European Law, and international/foreign laws. It explains the process of formation of laws in the UK Parliament and the significance of the European Union Law and the Human Rights Act of 1998. The paper also discusses the use of comparative law in the UK legal system.

Business Law
BUSINESS LAW
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The City and State
The Date

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Introduction
The main purpose of law in business assist regulate how but is to transactions contact
with each other. All businesses must operate within a legal framework. This paper will be
discussing the different sources of law in England and Wales. The first source that would be
covered is the parliamentary legislation. These are laws created by the United Kingdom (UK)
Parliament which is the only body with powers of enacting legislation. Another source of law is
the Case-law which is also referred to as the Common law. This is the law that has developed
through the adoption of rationales that have been held by Judges in the previous cases. Moving
on is the European Convention on Human Rights which has been incorporated into the UK Law
through the Human Rights Act of 1998 (HRA). The last source of law is the European Law. This
source comes as an adherence to the 1957 treaty the that the UK signed in 1973 to become a
member of the European Union (EU).
Statutes or Legislations
Legislations are classified as either primary or secondary legislation. Secondary
legislation may also be referred to as the subordinate or delegated legislation. Primary legislation
are also referred to as the statutes or Parliamentary Acts. These types of laws are enacted in
Parliament and they are regarded as the supreme form of the law. The UK parliament is the
supreme body for making the law, and it has the power to make and suspend a law (MacIntyre,
2016, p.8). The UK Parliament is divided is made up of the two houses, the House of Commons
and the House of Lords (HL). The process of the formation of the law starts with the presentation
of the of the Bill to the House of Commons after that it is then presented to the HL. If both
houses approve the Bill by a majority vote, it is then presented to the Queen who gives it a Royal
Assent to become a legislation.

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The normal procedure for a Bill to become a law is as follows;
The First reading: This is the first stage where the Bill is presented to the House of Commons.
Its title is read and published (MacIntyre, 2016, p.9).
The Second reading: The general provisions of the Bill are debated in the House of Commons
(MacIntyre, 2016, p.9).
The Committee stage: The provisions of the Bill are examined in detail and amendments are
made if any (MacIntyre, 2016, p.9).
Report stage: Votes are taken over the amendments (MacIntyre, 2016, p.9).
The Third reading: This happens to be the final stage. It involves consideration of the entire
Bill including the concluded amendments, and the MPs take the final voting. The members may
also engage in a short debate for taking minor amendments before taking a final vote for passing
the Bill (MacIntyre, 2016, p.9).
Presentation to the HL: The Bill undergoes a similar procedure like the one it underwent in the
House of Commons. If the HL suggests some amendments, the Bill goes back to the House of
Commons (Jones, 2013, p.47). The Bill can undergo this stage until both houses are satisfied
with all the provisions.
Royal Assent: The Queen gives her assent to the Bill before it becomes the law. Once this stage
has passed, the Bill becomes an Act of Parliament (Jones, 2013, p.48).
The Bills presented for enactment can be either Public or Private Bills. Public Bills are
concerned with matters such as those touching on the society in general or those dealing with a
particular Government statutory programme. Private Bills are those the government sponsors to
deal with matters that are specific to a certain location or group of people. Secondary legislation

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is made by bodies or persons who are granted authority under the Act of Parliament to enact such
legislation. These bodies or persons can be ministers or government bodies.
The Common Law
Unlike statute law, the common law refers to the adoption of a decision previously made
by the court instead of Acts of Parliament. In the UK, common law has been the main source of
law which mainly consist of fundamental legal principles which have been established by the
judges while deciding on various cases. The Common law systems of England dates back to the
time of the Norman conquest (Gibson and Fraser, 2013, p.14). Before then, different parts of
England were using different legal systems, and each was based on its own customs. When
William the Conqueror came to power in 1066, he created a centralized government and
standardized the law (Thomas, 2007, p.7). The process involved upholding rational custom
principles and rejecting the unreasonable. It was at this time the principle of stare decisis was
made which meant that an earlier decision must stand. Where there was no previous decision in
situations when there was a new problem, the decision formed was to be followed in future
similar situations. This trend resulted in the system of ‘Common law’ which was used
consistently to decide cases and predict the outcome of every particular situation.
The ‘common law’ principles are still applied today in legal decisions under the concept
of stare decisis. Within the common law, there is also the concept of precedent. This is a system
in the modern court system where Courts follow a hierarchical system and judges in the lower
courts have to follow the decisions made by the Courts higher in the hierarchy (case law)
(Adams, 2014, p.29).

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European Union Law
The EU law was part of the international laws that were originally denoted to as
European Community Law. The EU is an international organization made up of some European
countries. According to (Forsberg, 2013), the EU was formed to mainly deal with issues such as
those involving political, military, and economic matters among member states. The union also
deals with other common factors that affect the states. EU law constitutes treaties signed by the
members, judgments, and enacted laws which form parts of the legal systems among the member
states. The EU law is binding to the states and it supersedes national laws where there is a
conflict of laws dealing with human rights, political, economic or other matters.
According to (Khorana and Garcia, 2018, p.38), the EU law is usually classified as
primary, secondary, and supplementary law. The primary laws are those that are contained in the
signed EU treaties (Khorana and Garcia, 2018, p.38). Both the government and the EU
negotiate the treaty, and after the negotiation, both parties sign the treaty which its operation in
the member state pend until it has been ratified in the parliament of that country. The treaties
contain the roles, institutions that form up the EU, the bodies that make decisions and legislation,
the executive and various practices that underpin the laws and their implementation. Once
regulations become laws and are ratified by the states, the immediately become operational and
override any contradicting domestic law. Unlike directives, regulations never require any
implementation measures. According to (Adams, 2014, p.20), the EU directives require the
members to achieve adhere to some measure and achieve laid out results. As legislations are
made from decisions, European Court of Justice (ECJ) ensures uniform interpretation and
implementation of the EU laws among members (MacIntyre, 2016, p.27).

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The EU secondary laws are acts and agreements made with member states for governing
their activities to achieve a particular pre-determined goal (Khorana and Garcia, 2018, p.38). For
instance, the unilateral acts contained in Article 288 of the treaty which has the provisions that
govern EU operations. The Acts has provisions for recommendations, decisions, opinions,
regulations, and directives as contained in Article 288. The EU supplementary laws provide
general legal principles that have been developed in the ECJ (Khorana and Garcia, 2018, p.38).
Apart from the case law, supplementary laws also allow the court to fill in the gaps that were not
handled by either both the primary and secondary laws. For example, the supplementary law may
have provisions for customs of trade practices and other international provisions not contained in
the written law.
European Convention on Human Rights
According to (Amos, 2017), the UK was one first states that contributed to the founding
of the Council of Europe (COE) after it ratified the Statute COE 1949 and later the ratification
of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in 1951. The UK enacted the HRA in
October 2000 which was based on ECHR. The act contained various sections of ECHR that hold
some effects of codifying the safeguarding of the rights contained in the convention to the UK
law. Following this, the rights contained in the ECHR forms part of the UK law and they are
recognized in the UK courts. It also means that any person can bring a human rights case in UK
court without creating a necessity to go and argue the case at Strasbourg.
The significance of ECHR can be seen in Lord Bingham comments in the case of (Ullah
v Special Adjudicator, [2004]) where the Judge stated that national courts have a duty to keep
pace with the jurisprudence of the Strasbourg as it keeps evolving. The applications of ECHR
can be viewed in two main areas of relevance in the UK domestic law. The first one is that the

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UK law will always try to maintain the compatibility of their interpretation of domestic
legislation with the ECHR provisions. Again, while enacting laws, the UK parliament also has to
avoid breaching the ECHR provisions. Secondly, this rationale has been awarded a specific force
under section 2(1) (Human Rights Act, 1998). The section states that either the tribunal or the
court determining a case connected to the convention must consider the decisions, judgment and
declarations made by the European Court of Human Rights.
International/Foreign Laws as a Sources on UK Domestic Law
International or Foreign laws find their way to England legal system through comparative
law. The work of (Örücü, 2005), stated that the UK legal system stand with one foot in the ius
commune novum with rest of Continental Europe legal systems while the other foot remains in
the ‘unity of common law’ engraved Commonwealth legal systems and that of the US together
with laws from other jurisdictions such as Scotland. According to (Gerven, 2008), UK judges use
foreign laws and judgments as a comparative guide while interpreting English law either as
supplementary or substantively, and the UK HL judges who have worked with the
Commonwealth’s principles have been accustomed to the use of comparative law than the judges
in other jurisdictions.
While viewing ECHR as an international law, the HRA places a legal obligation for the
recognition of ECHR principles. Some scholars such as (Knop, 1999) have also observed the
Human Right Acts and EU treaties have caused transjudicial negotiation on human rights which
are a combination of the provisions of international law, comparative law, and constitutional law.
Again, even prior to the enactment of HRA, the UK House of Lords were applying the
comparative methods to consult the decisions of other jurisdictions. For instance, in (White v
Jones, [1995]), the Lords engaged a comparative approach with Judge Nicholas pointing that

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there were courts in other jurisdictions who had given opposite conclusions on a similar matter.
By other jurisdiction, the Judge was referring to countries such as the United States, Germany,
Australia, and New Zealand. Another case is the decision of (A v. Secretary of State for the
Home Department (No 2), [2005]) where the HL used determination of foreign courts to
compare the interpretation of rights.
Conclusion
As stated in the introduction, this paper intended to analyze the legal system of the UK by
looking at the main sources of the law. To accomplish this objective, the paper has explained the
relevant areas of the common law system which was more of an illustration of the common law
legal method and its effect in UK law. Following the same approach, the paper has discussed
other sources such as the EU law, the legislature, the ECHR, and the international law.

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