Robert Peston Robert Peston

The Supreme Court has put MPs in charge. What will they do now?

There is no precedent for the Supreme Court finding that a PM acted unlawfully when advising the serving monarch.

There is no precedent for the Supreme Court ruling that an order in the Privy Council to prorogue parliament is null and void.

There is no precedent at all for the august and magisterial ceremony in parliament that sends MPs and Lords home being ruled by judges as a pointless exercise that should now be viewed as never having taken place.

There is no precedent for judges to have ruled that parliament is in effect still sitting, that legislation that had been thought to have been lost is in effect still alive, after MPs and Lords had been told by the PM that their services were not required for five weeks.

Boris Johnson’s single biggest act since becoming PM in July, sending locking MPs and Lords out of their debating chambers, has been ruled as a grotesque breach of the UK’s unwritten constitution. The PM has been humbled in the courts like no PM in history.

So what on earth happens now?

The most important point is that the Supreme Court has formalised that Boris Johnson’s minority government is the servant of the House of Commons, and it will intervene to prevent any attempt by him to neuter MPs’ power. That means he is their captive. That when they say ‘no to no-deal’, he has no route left to get around them.

So he has a choice. He can work with MPs to find a compromise. Or he can quit.

Now you might think the PM would resign, given that the extent of today’s humiliation and that his aim of Brexit by 31 October, deal or no deal, do or die, now looks wholly undermined, impossible.

Boris Johnson said last night there was no chance of him quitting.

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Robert Peston
Written by
Robert Peston
Robert Peston is Political Editor of ITV News and host of the weekly political discussion show Peston. His articles originally appeared on his ITV News blog.

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