The Form of Legislation and the Rule of Law
Date: 24 January 2023
Time: 18.00 - 19.00 (registration from 17.30)
Event Details
Quality in legislation is not in the eye of the drafter who prepares it, nor the politician who creates it, nor even in the eye of the legislator who enacts it. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder - in the person who will actually be subject to that legislation, who will use it and be bound by it.
How can we deal with legislation that is too hard to understand, too complex and too voluminous? One solution lies in the form of that legislation - how it is constructed, the words and sentences used, and how they relate to one another. How might Rule of Law principles be applied to the form of legislation in order to improve that legislation? This event brings together experts from different disciplines to address this question: academics, legislators and legislative drafters. It discusses the issues arising in the context of a recently published book by Dr Ronan Cormacain entitled The Form of Legislation and the Rule of Law.
Speakers
- Professor Helen Xanthaki, President, International Association for Legislation; Member, Committee for the Scrutiny of the Lawmaking Process, Presidency of the Hellenic Government; UCL Faculty of Laws, University College London
- David Anderson, Lord Anderson of Ipswich KBE KC, Former Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation
- Dame Brenda King DCB, Attorney General for Northern Ireland, Former First Legislative Counsel for Northern Ireland
Event convened by Dr Ronan Cormacain, Consultant Legislative Counsel, Editor of Theory and Practice of Legislation, Former Senior Research Fellow, Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law.