Talk:Statute of Westminster 1931

message: I changed the article back because these changes seem unfocused, and perhaps not encyclopedic.  I suggest working out the change here on the talk page and then editing the article itself. Peter Grey 8 July 2005 18:20 (UTC)\
That's fine. Gbambino initiated the changes by deleting something he shouldn't have deleted. I'm find with the status quo ante. AndyL 8 July 2005 18:23 (UTC)
:I question what relevance the following phrase has in relation to this article: "In any case there can be no effective restriction on the powers of those Parliaments which recognise the doctrine of Parliamentary supremacy, namely the United Kingdom and New Zealand, within their national territory."  As the preamble to the Statute is not legally binding in any Realm then what difference does it make in this matter if New Zealand recognises Parliamentary supremacy and Canada does not?  The only thing Parliamentary supremacy is relevant to is how easily a country can alter its own copy of the Statute -- for the U.K. and New Zealand it takes merely an Act of Parliament, for Canada it takes the agreement of 10 provincial legislatures and the federal Parliament, in Australia it is something similar...  The inclusion of the above phrase, and the wording of it, implies that New Zealand, the U.K., etc., are not bound by the Statute because of their adherence to Parliamentary supremacy, whereas Canada, Australia, and other Realms are bound, and must therefore obediently and unquestioningly follow any changes the U.K. or New Zealand may make to the line of succession.  Jonathan David Makepeace, another republican associated with Citizens for a Canadian republic, tried to argue this before on Talk:Monarchy in Canada, and it is, of course, wrong. --gbambino 14:43, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The myth is that since the legislative powers of Parliament in the UK are unlimited, it can amend the Statute of Westminster and then somehow the leap is made to implying that the versions outside the UK would change with it.  If you think of Parliament abrogating the 1783 Treaty of Paris, and then going on to, say, abolish the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, you can see how silly the idea really is. Peter Grey 15:01, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

text: I put up a wording based on -- what else -- Justice Rouleau's ruling.  (In parentheses since it's an aside.) Peter Grey 15:58, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  8 July 2005 

message: For those realms such as Belize, Jamacia, Barbadous etc- can the Statute of Westminster Act 1931 apply? The Statute was never amended. Astrotrain 19:26, August 26, 2005 (UTC)
:It doesn't apply per se, but the Acts that gave those places independence would either include it by reference or include similar terms.  (this is just an educated guess, by the way, I haven't checked what they actually do)  Morwen - Talk 21:44, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Realms created after 1931

message: The Statute applied to multiple countries that were part of the British Empire, so why is there a table at the bottom that applies to Canada? I think it shouldn't be there, or every country that this applied to should be there.
I have removed the Canadian table as it is a point of inconsistency.  Why have a table dedicated to just one realm?  Either have them all or none.  But I can tell that the Canadian table is just going to be added back in.  I'm new to wikipedia so I don't know what to do about this. --Parraluke (talk) 17:56, 18 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a navbox, not a table. It exists so readers focusing on matters related to the Canadian constitution can navigate between articles that fall within that scope; it's therefore in all the articles that fall within that scope. "Inconsistency" thus isn't a justification for removing it. And, even so, would adding navboxes for other relams' constitutions not be an alternative to deleting one because it's alone? --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 18:06, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

text: Problem solved, anyway: There's a constitution of Canada navbox at the foot of the article. The veritcal navbox is thus redundant. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 18:09, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

text: Ok so navboxes for all the other associated countries will be added. --Parraluke (talk) 18:09, 18 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Canada Table

message: OK, so why did the MacDonald government call it the "Statute of Westminster 1931?" Aren't all statutes passed by the British Parliament passed in Westminster? -- Mwalcoff 00:36, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know who wrote the sentence above, but the "MacDonald" here would obviously have to be Ramsay MacDonald, Prime Minister of the UK at the time of the Royal Assent of this statute. However, the question raised remains to answered...Autokefal Dialytiker (talk) 23:15, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  The name 

message: For example, in a referendum held in Western Australia in April 1933, 68% of voters voted for the state to leave the Commonwealth of Australia with the aim of becoming a separate Dominion within the British Empire. The state government sent a delegation to Westminster to cause the result to be enacted, but the British Parliament refused to intervene on the grounds that it was a matter for the Commonwealth of Australia. 
:Question: Did the UK Parliament actually consider the matter?  I could be wrong, but I think it's more likely the UK Government considered it and made the call that "it was a matter for the Commonwealth of Australia", in which case it would never have come before their parliament at all.  Anyone know the real story?  --  JackofOz (talk) 06:00, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Update for that link:  http://www.law.mq.edu.au/public/download/?id=16258  --Wikiain (talk) 01:22, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Western Australian secession

message: Residual powers over the constitution existed in relation to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. In 1947, New Zealand adopted the Statute of Westminster and passed the New Zealand Constitution (request and consent) act. The UK parliament then passed the New Zealand Constitution (amendment) act in the same year, hence patriating the New Zealand constitution. No further acts of the British parliament were therefore ever needed in relation to amending the New Zealand constitution. New Zealand became effectively independent in 1947. The New Zealand Constitution act 1986 only involved the New Zealand parliament. This was in contrast to the Canada Act of 1982 and the Australia Act of 1986 which both required parallel legislation in the UK parliament.
The New Zealand Constitution act of 1986 actually purported to repeal the very act of the UK parliament which had given New Zealand effective independence in the first place. It did so with the intent of obtaining an independence which already existed anyhow, and had it been effective would actually have had the reverse effect. As it was, it was ineffective, and New Zealand continued to be independent on the basis of the 1947 Statute of Westminster (Adoption) Act which had its authority in the 1931 Statute of Westminster act that was passed by the UK parliament. 
For a clarification of the issues relating to saving powers for the constitutions of Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, see  David Tombe (talk) 13:15, 23 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Zealand 

message: The article as it stands reports that the Irish Free State let 24 hours pass before recognising the abdication.  Citation please - it was certainly not an Act of the Dáil (Parliament) [see http://www.acts.ie/en.toc.decade.html]. Would it have been a Statutory Instrument or similar? --Red King (talk) 20:23, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It was recognised by statute, I think, but the names of the Acts are a little cryptic! The Constitution (Amendment No. 27) Act removed the King from his constitutional role; this was on 11 December, the same day as the Act of Abdication gained royal assent in the UK. The Executive Authority (External Relations) Act 1936 () was the one which put Edward VIII's abdication into force "immediately upon the passing of this Act"; it  was dated the following day - the 11th. Shimgray | talk | 21:46, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Irish Free State 

message: UK-specific categories keep getting added to this article (most recently replacing other, less specific ones; i.e. "Category:Bilateral relations of Australia" to "Category:Australia-United Kingdom relations"). This is problematic, since the Statute of Westminster isn't relevant only to the UK's external affairs; it is to all the Commonwealth realms' external affairs with the other Commonwealth realms. The most concise and consistent way of dealing with this seems to be to place this article in all the relevant "Bilateral relations of [country]" categories, in which are sub-categories or articles about that country's relations with other Commonwealth countries (such as "Australia-United Kingdom relations", "Belize-United Kingdom relations", "New Zealand-United Kingdom relations", and all the other aforementioned UK-specific ones). --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 20:40, 6 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Categories 

message: The section "Australia" begins:  "However, section nine of the Statute of Westminster allowed the Colonial Laws Validity Act 1865 to have continued application in the six Australian states and the Australian Capital Territory; this allowed the British parliament to continue to pass legislation concerning the states and territory ..."  But s 9 mentions only the states.  And, if the statement is correct for the ACT (which I doubt), presumably it would also be correct for the other territories, so that they too should be mentioned.  Any objection to removing the words "and the Australian Capital Territory" and "and territory"? --Wikiain (talk) 01:18, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Australia 

message: The statement "largely sovereign" is confused - see sovereign state. A state is either sovereign or it is not: it is a rather binary status. For sovereignty a state must have "supremacy in the domestic policy and independence in the foreign one" and also note that "a sovereign state is neither dependent on nor subjected to any other power or state". Whilst a state can choose to follow the foreign policy of an external entity or another state (for example, the members of the European Union) if they have sovereignty they can repudiate that position. A non-sovereign state cannot (for example, the states of the United States).
The Statute of Westminster made the Dominion parliaments fully the masters of their own destiny. Whilst many of them maintained adherence to the United Kingdom's structures for decades afterwards, from the passing of the Statute they had the right to go their own way entirely by their own volition. That is sovereignty. If they had in any way not had that right - if any portion had been reserved - they would not have.
In summary:
* "largely sovereign" is not a possible state
* the Statute of Westminster gave full sovereignty to the Dominions
Mauls (talk) 09:59, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems nobody has responded to this for more than a year, but I'll step in: The Statute of Westminster explicitly retained for the British Parliament the ability to legislate regarding the constitutions of Canada and New Zealand. In Canada at least the Canadian government needed to request such legislation, but legally the British Parliament had to act to implement such requests. So in this sense the UK retained a vestige of sovereignty over both states until the 1980s, when their constitutions were patriated. However as far as I know this power was never used or even contemplated as a tool to impose Britian's will on Canada or New Zealand, so the issue quickly became entirely theoretical, and I think it's safe to say that Britain's practical ability to do so was fairly minimal -- attempt by the British government to act in this way almost certainly would have been unilaterally rejected by Canada or New Zealand. So I think "largely sovereign" is a perfectly fine way to capture this situation. --Jfruh (talk) 18:35, 5 November 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sovereignty 

message: Constitutional Law 1.01 in England and Wales (Scots doctrine is a bit different) always used to be that Parliament is omni-competent, and can in principle pass pretty much any law it likes, even (classic textbook example) forbidding Frenchmen to smoke on the streets of Paris. Enforcing it would be a different matter, of course.
I don't really have a source to hand, but for many years the Statute of Westminster used to be discussed in constitutional law textbooks in the context of whether Parliament could limit its own jurisdiction, or whether it was - in the realms of legal metaphysics - simply an act of voluntary self-restraint (i.e. Parliament could still in theory vote requiring Canadians to fly the Union Jack instead of the Maple Leaf - it would be perfectly valid law in the UK, but they just wouldn't be able to enforce it in Canada).Paulturtle (talk) 06:56, 5 November 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Importance in English Constitutional Law