{"id":2481,"date":"2011-12-08T22:03:38","date_gmt":"2011-12-08T22:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/colombotelegraph.com\/?p=2481"},"modified":"2011-12-08T22:03:38","modified_gmt":"2011-12-08T22:03:38","slug":"law-regardless-of-the-law-srima-5-jr-39-and-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/law-regardless-of-the-law-srima-5-jr-39-and-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Law Regardless of the Law – Srima 5 JR 39 and now ?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne<\/strong> –<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne<\/p><\/div>\n

The Revival of Underperforming Enterprises and Underutilised Assets Bill that was passed as an urgent\u00a0Bill has generated much public discussion about its content as well as the procedure followed. It is the\u00a0procedure followed that I wish to write about and not the policy involved.<\/p>\n

Urgent Bills<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ordinary Bills are published in the Gazette seven days before it is presented to Parliament. A Bill can be\u00a0challenged in the Supreme Court within seven days of the first reading. On the other hand, an urgent Bill\u00a0is not Gazetted but is sent to the Supreme Court to decide on its constitutionality. The Court is given\u00a0between 24 hours to three days to make its determination, the period being determined by the\u00a0President. Even MPs get copies of the Bill only on the day it is presented to Parliament. So, a citizen has\u00a0to challenge an urgent Bill without even seeing it. While there may good reason to pass a Bill urgently,\u00a0the problem is that under both the 1972 and 1978 Constitutions, the constitutionality of an Act of\u00a0Parliament cannot be questioned in a court after it has been passed.<\/p>\n

The concept of urgent Bills was introduced by the 1972 Constitution. It must be said in fairness to the\u00a0Sirimavo Bandaranaike Government that only five Bills were presented as urgent Bills. It is the J.R.\u00a0Jayawardena that gave the lead in misusing the urgent Bill provision. During the period July 1977 to\u00a0August 1978, as much as fifteen Bills were urgent Bills. During the period 1978 to 1986, thirty nine were\u00a0urgent Bills. All successive Governments followed JR.<\/p>\n

In practice, even ordinary Bills go unnoticed. In the olden days, newspaper reports on Parliamentary\u00a0debates had a list of Bills presented, but not\u00a0anymore. Bills are not always available at the Publications\u00a0Bureau. The effect of most legislative provisions are felt only when they are being enforced. There have\u00a0been many instances of obviously unconstitutional provisions going unchallenged.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

If in the future a Government brings a Bill that seeks to proscribe a few named trade unions during a period of industrial unrest alleging that their actions are hurting the national economy or to ban a few named newspapers as being anti-national, there is nothing that can be done once the law is passed. This is the danger of legislative classifications when post-enactment judicial review is not available.<\/p><\/div>\n

An argument against post-enactment judicial review is that there should be certainty as regards the\u00a0constitutionality of legislation. Also, rights and liabilities that may have accrued under the law in\u00a0question would be wiped out, with drastic consequences. However, no serious problems have arisen in\u00a0jurisdictions where post-enactment judicial review is permitted. To mitigate hardships that may be\u00a0caused by legal provisions being struck down years later, the Indian Supreme Court has used the tool of\u00a0\u201cprospective over-ruling\u201d, limiting the retrospective effect of a declaration of invalidity in appropriate\u00a0cases. The South African Constitution expressly permits such limitation.<\/p>\n

If post-enactment judicial review is allowed, a Government will not be able to misuse the urgent Bills\u00a0provision. The All Party Representative Committee (APRC) has also agreed that post-enactment judicial review should be permitted with a safeguard as in South Africa.<\/p>\n

Legislative classification<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ordinarily a law will not make any classification of the persons or things for the purpose of applying its\u00a0provisions but would leave it to the discretion of the Government to select and classify persons or things\u00a0to whom its provisions are to apply and lay down the principles or policy for the guidance of the exercise\u00a0of discretion by the Government. If the Government does not follow such policy or guidelines, any\u00a0affected person could challenge the decision of the Government in court. Many such laws also provide\u00a0for an appeal procedure.<\/p>\n

The Business Acquisition Act moved by Dr. N.M. Perera provides that every order of acquisition made by\u00a0the Minister should be approved by Parliament. Also, there is an appeal to an Advisory Board against\u00a0such an order. Any person aggrieved by the takeover of land under the Land Reform Law could\u00a0challenge an order of the Land Reform Commission in courts. The Ceiling on Housing Property Law\u00a0provides for a Board of Review and a decision of the Board is reviewable by courts.<\/p>\n

When a Bill does not leave the classification to the Government but names the persons or entities to\u00a0which the provisions of the Bill apply, the accepted legal principle is that if a reasonable basis for the\u00a0classification does not appear on the face of it or is not deducible from the surrounding circumstances\u00a0or matters of common knowledge, Bill should be struck down.<\/p>\n

An example of such a law is the Lake House Takeover Law. The Bill was not an urgent Bill and was\u00a0reviewed by the Constitutional Court for several days. The Court noted that the Press Commission\u00a0headed by a Supreme Court judge had recommended that Lake House be acquired and that the Criminal\u00a0Justice Commission had found that Lake House and several of its Directors had violated the Exchange\u00a0Control Act and the Income Tax Act. The Court held that the takeover of Lake House could be justified\u00a0on that basis.<\/p>\n

The Revival of Underperforming Enterprises and Underutilised Assets Bill named the entities to be taken\u00a0over and no material was placed before the Supreme Court to explain on what basis the entities were\u00a0selected. With post-enactment judicial review not being available, there is now no remedy.\u00a0If in the future a Government brings a Bill that seeks to proscribe a few named trade unions during a\u00a0period of industrial unrest alleging that their actions are hurting the national economy or to ban a few\u00a0named newspapers as being anti-national, there is nothing that can be done once the law is passed. This\u00a0is the danger of legislative classifications when post-enactment judicial review is not available.<\/p>\n

Agrarian Development (Amendment Bill)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Agrarian services is a devolved subject but in 1991 the UNP Government misinterpreted a judgment of\u00a0the Supreme Court judgment and took over Provincial Departments of Agrarian Services. Despite the\u00a0Supreme Court clarifying in a subsequent case that matters relating to landlords and tenant cultivators\u00a0come under the Provincial Councils, the departments have still not been handed back. The Agrarian\u00a0Development Act was recently amended. While the provisions of the Bill relating to tenant cultivators\u00a0may be laudable, none of the parliamentarians who speak outside in favour of devolution and the full\u00a0implementation of the 13th Amendment raised the issue that agrarian services is a devolved subject and\u00a0should be handed back to Provincial Councils for administration.<\/p>\n

This article is provided by “Anik Pituwa” team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":2484,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,31,57,8],"tags":[1143,1574,1139,1575,1134,1576,1577,1578,1579],"class_list":["post-2481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anti-corruption","category-judiciary","category-law-and-order","category-editorial","tag-authoritarianism","tag-business-acquisition-act","tag-democracy","tag-dr-jayampathy-wickramaratne","tag-human-rights","tag-income-tax-act","tag-lake-house-takeover-law","tag-legislative-classification","tag-post-enactment-judicial-review"],"yoast_head":"\nLaw Regardless of the Law - Srima 5 JR 39 and now ? - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/law-regardless-of-the-law-srima-5-jr-39-and-now\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Law Regardless of the Law - Srima 5 JR 39 and now ? 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