Now that Dominic Grieve and Ken Clarke have left the government, the Tory Party had set out on its reformist agenda for Europe without resistance from the heart of its own grip on power. They are buoyed up by the knowledge that the public is irritated by the pontifications of the European Court of Human Rights and are happy with the notion of Britain pulling out and setting up its own Bill Of Rights. The argument behind this is that the UK Parliament should make all laws and that this parliament is sovereign.
In a democracy this is not quite true. The people are sovereign and exercise their sovereignty through parliament which they elect. Britain is one of only three democracies in the world without a formal written constitution. What such an instrument does is to limit the power of the legislature and government to enact laws or regulations which erode the agreed framework and limitations within which government must function. Because Britain has no such formal instrument of state, it relies on custom and practice and various statutes, any of which can be changed by any parliamentary majority at any time. Essentially the establishment can make up the constitution as it goes along.
Should government fall into malevolent or misguided hands, this could be calamitous for individual freedom, were it not for the Human Rights Act, which underpins not only nationally, but internationally, the rights and freedoms of every person in the land. If this is swept away, and even more so if Britain leaves Europe (and if Scotland leaves the UK), it seems to this blog that the need for a formal written constitution for whatever remains of the UK is an essential requirement not only for the inalienable protection of the rights and freedoms of British Citizens, but also to lay down a clear framework and set of limitations within which government must function.
The difference is that governments can change laws if they have a majority in parliament, without having an actual majority in the country. In a proper democracy the constitution can only be changed by a majority of the people.