eurealist.co.uk

The Parking and Traffic Appeals Service is facing yet another challenge under the Bill of Rights,

this time it has been submitted by a solicitor.

Solicitor Frank Rayner, Is not disputing the facts of the case, he is instead claiming that the
Transport for London`s attempt to impose a penalty charge(s) is unlawful, on the basis that
it is extorting money and is in breach of the express provisions
of the Declaration / Bill of Rights 1689.

The law relevant to this appeal is the Declaration of Rights and the Bill of Rights upon which it is
based which clearly states:
That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void

As the Bill of Rights was passed in 1689 it might seem to be old law. Although the Bill of rights
is an act of settlement and states that any attempts to change it are unlawful, it has in the main
been ignored by elected parliamentarians who like to argue that our parliament is sovereign it
can make any law it wishes, and that as one government cannot bind a successor, any new
aw made by parliament overturns an older law.

That was the generally understood position until some people were charged with selling in
imperial instead of metric.
At the time the latest law passed by parliament had allowed imperial measurements.
So of course the charges were challenged because they were based on an older law which
had naturally been overturned or changed by the subsequent law.

In steps the aptly named Lord Justice Laws, who it is suggested is a staunch supporter of the state,
after listening to all the evidence, Lord Justice Laws ruled that in fact it is incorrect to claim that any
new law overturns an older law, because some laws are more important (they were constitutional),
and could not just be simply repealed or changed.
He ruled that although parliament could change any law, it would have to state clearly that its intention
was to change a constitutional law, if they did not, then the original law remained and took precedence
of a later law.

To illustrate his ruling he used such laws as the Magna Charta, the Bill of Rights
and 1972 act of accession to the EU.

Lord Justice Laws ruling if taken at face value means that any subsequent law introduced since
the Bill of Rights which did not clearly state that it was repealing or changing the Bill of Rights
was not legally enforceable.

This opens up a whole new can of worms for the government and the legal profession, because there
are already on the statute books several laws which have been introduced since 1689 which contradict
the Bill of rights, and only those laws which stated clearly that they were changing the Bill of Rights
had the force of law.

The provisions enacting the Congestion Charge Scheme do not in fact state that they the bill is
changing the Bill of Rights, but they are imposing a fine or a forfeit before conviction,
which is directly against the provisions of the Bill of Rights.

So far the government has continued to side step this point and have quietly dropped any cases
which have been challenged under the Bill of Rights.

The latest wrinkle in this saga is the recent ruling by Lord Justice Collins, which although not
challenging the Laws ruling said it was permissible to make these fines / forfeits because
they were not in fact fines but civil duties.