There is potential for a private prosecution to be brought against the prime minister, Boris Johnson, for the unlawful prorogation of Parliament, a criminal lawyer has suggested.
A previous attempt to prosecute Johnson for misconduct in public office over the misleading ‘£350m a week’ bus advert during the Leave campaign was dismissed by the High Court in June. Following the Supreme Court’s seismic judgment this week, however, ‘an ambitious private prosecutor might be tempted to have a new bite at the cherry,’ according to Danielle Reece-Greenhalgh, associate at Corker Binning.
Reece-Greenhalgh explained that two factors caused the previous attempt to fail: first, that Johnson was not ‘acting as a public officer’ during the Leave campaign; and, second, insufficient evidence that he had ‘willfully’ neglected to perform his duty or misconducted himself. She said these factors would not apply to a prosecution over prorogation because Johnson was ‘undoubtedly acting as a public officer when he embarked on this course. In relation to the second problem, the Supreme Court was careful not to make any finding as to Mr Johnson’s motive in proroguing Parliament. However, the finding that Mr Johnson had no “reasonable justification for taking action which had such an extreme effect upon the fundamentals of our democracy” certainly lays the foundations for an argument that Mr Johnson’s actions amounted to a willful abuse of public trust.’
Meanwhile, the Electoral Reform Society has called on MPs to establish a citizen-led ‘constitutional convention’ whereby an assembly of citizens is convened to make decisions about constitutional change.
Dr Jess Garland, the society’s director of policy and research, said: ‘Our constitutional arrangements leave Parliament weak in the face of an overbearing executive. The outdated Westminster set-up needs a complete overhaul.’
