This leads on to the belief that the constitution should not be changed because it has gradually become perfected over the centuries in which it has been used so that the current government has every advantage. It has been modified and changed over hundreds of years to fit in with social and political changes and so it must be the best it can for it to have worked for so long. The reason for the government and Parliament to eventually have the definitive power over the country is because the constitution has slowly moved away from the Crown and royalty’s powers and towards government and Parliament. Another example of a gradual and natural change can be seen in the process of the Prime Minister becoming more significant since the 1960’s due to more media concentration on current affairs.
It is believed by many, including the Conservatives, that the codification of the British Constitution is simply unnecessary as the UK has a stable political system already and so there is no need to change it. They feel that ‘it has served Britain well for centuries’ and that there have been no revolutions or violent protests against it which proves how it has worked. They may also say that to turn Britain into a codified constitution would be very difficult and lengthy and that the end result would not be worth it. For Britain to become codified rules and law would need to be written down, this would be a problem because the UK operates under a large number of unwritten conventions (in particular the monarchy and prerogative powers) and therefore making it very hard to transfer these onto paper.
Within Britain there are currently no safeguards which means that the government can be more powerful, this can be seen in both a positive and negative way. Someone against the codification would say that the power that government has is a positive thing because it means that it can deal with issues and problems without anything inhibiting it. An example of this problem can be seen in the USA where the fear of the constitution prevents the government and Congress from acting decisively.
Someone who sees the fact that government can be more powerful in a negative way (for example a Liberal) would say that an over-powering government can threaten individual rights, the position of minorities and the influence of public opinion. They feel that a codified Britain would stop the movement, that is happening at the moment, to greater government power. Supporters of a codified constitution suggest that there are no real ‘checks and balances’ - a very important principle to the American constitution. They feel that for government to be able to speak on behalf of the people, Parliament needs to have more codified powers.
Liberals have been calling for a codified constitution for many years and during this period have come up with multiple ways in which it would benefit Britain. One important point that they say is that if we were to turn codified then it would be easier for British citizens to understand. They feel that many people at the moment are very confused by the ‘British Constitution’ that does not technically exist and it is very easy to see why; they say that by creating a real constitution, public awareness of politics will grow, as will support.
Liberals and those in favour of a codified constitution would also believe that for Britain to keep up with other countries and not seem backward in a political sense, it should become codified. More pressure has now been added by Britain joining the European Community this is because not having a constitution makes political relations with the EU quite difficult, it is also frustrating for Britain and the European parties when attempting to create coherent relations with Europe. Therefore they believe that becoming a codified constitution will put the UK into line with most other modern democracies.
It is unclear if there will ever be a definite answer from Parliament as to whether Britain will become more codified or stay the same, however with Conservative likely to take over in the next general election we can predict that it is extremely unlikely that they will be completely changing the constitution any time soon.
