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54-404: [REDACTED] Canada portal The Canada Act 1982 (1982 c. 11; French: Loi de 1982 sur le Canada ) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom and one of the enactments which make up the Constitution of Canada . It was enacted at the request of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada to patriate Canada's constitution, ending the power of the British Parliament to amend

108-425: A contingent election between the top two candidates. A constitutional convention developed that Congress would always elect the candidate with the most popular votes at a contingent election. In a television interview ahead of the 1964 Chilean presidential election , presidential candidate (and eventual winner) Eduardo Frei Montalva upheld this convention. However, this convention was nearly broken in 1970 , where

162-415: A body of law known as constitutional law has existed for hundreds of years. As part of this uncodified British constitution , constitutional conventions play a key role. They are rules that are observed by the various constituted parts though they are not written in any document having legal authority; there are often underlying enforcing principles that are themselves not formal and codified. Nonetheless it

216-581: A certain type of power, which is not prohibited by law, arouses such opposition that it becomes impossible, on future occasions, to engage in further exercises of this power. For example, the constitutional convention that the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom cannot remain in office without the support of a majority of members of the House of Commons is derived from an unsuccessful attempt by

270-401: A number of stages before it can become law. In theory, this allows the bill's provisions to be debated in detail, and for amendments to the original bill to also be introduced, debated, and agreed to. In bicameral parliaments, a bill that has been approved by the chamber into which it was introduced then sends the bill to the other chamber. Broadly speaking, each chamber must separately agree to

324-466: A private member's bill). In Australia, the bill passes through the following stages: In Canada, the bill passes through the following stages: The committee considers each clause of the bill, and may make amendments to it. Significant amendments may be made at the committee stage. In some cases, whole groups of clauses are inserted or removed. However, if the Government holds a majority, almost all

378-526: A specific chamber. For example, bills imposing a tax , or involving public expenditure , are introduced into the House of Commons in the United Kingdom, Canada's House of Commons , Lok Sabha of India and Ireland's Dáil as a matter of law. Conversely, bills proposed by the Law Commission and consolidation bills traditionally start in the House of Lords . Once introduced, a bill must go through

432-493: A state. In some states, notably those Commonwealth of Nations states that follow the Westminster system and whose political systems derive from British constitutional law , most government functions are guided by constitutional convention rather than by a formal written constitution. In these states, actual distribution of power may be markedly different from those the formal constitutional documents describe. In particular,

486-470: Is codified in the Spanish Constitution of 1978 , which formalizes the relationship between an independent constitutional monarchy , the government, and the legislature. However, the constitution invests the monarch as the "arbitrator and moderator of the institutions" of government. The following constitutional conventions are part of the political culture of Switzerland . They hold true at

540-557: Is presented to the Governor General , who gives it royal assent . Although the Governor General can refuse to assent a bill, this power has never been exercised. Bills being reviewed by Parliament are assigned numbers: 2 to 200 for government bills, 201 to 1000 for private member's bills , and 1001 up for private bills . They are preceded by C- if they originate in the House of Commons, or S- if they originate in

594-588: Is regarded as authoritative in a number of other jurisdictions, including the UK. Some conventions evolve or change over time. For example, before 1918 the British Cabinet requested a parliamentary dissolution from the monarch, with the Prime Minister conveying the request. Between 1918 and 2011, Prime Ministers requested dissolutions on their own initiative, and were not required to consult members of

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648-679: The Constitution Act, 1982 . The Canada Act 1982 received royal assent on March 29 in London , but it did not take full effect immediately. Canada's Constitution Act, 1982, was proclaimed in force by Elizabeth II as Queen of Canada on April 17 on Parliament Hill in Ottawa . The proclamation marked the end of a long process and efforts by many successive governments to patriate the Constitution. The proclamation brought into force

702-665: The Province of Canada (now Ontario and Quebec ) with Nova Scotia and New Brunswick into a Dominion within the British Empire . Canada adopted a Westminster -style government with a Parliament of Canada . A governor general fulfilled the constitutional duties of the British sovereign on Canadian soil. Similar arrangements applied within each province. Despite this autonomy, the United Kingdom still had

756-401: The "conventions of the constitution", or constitutional morality. A century later, Canadian scholar Peter Hogg wrote: Conventions are rules of the constitution which are not enforced by the law courts. Because they are not enforced by the law courts they are best regarded as non-legal rules, but because they do in fact regulate the working of the constitution they are an important concern of

810-403: The 1950s, it had also become a convention that elections should be held on the last Saturday of November, or the closest date to this range as possible. There are several times when these conventions have been broken and an election has been held several months earlier: Because of the 1814 written constitution's pivotal role in providing independence and establishing democracy in the 19th century,

864-512: The Cabinet (although, at the very least, it would have been unusual for the Cabinet not to be aware of the Prime Minister's intention). In 2024 Prime Minister Rishi Sunak reportedly announced his intention to hold an early election in July 2024 without even informing most of his cabinet prior to the announcement. However, conventions are rarely ever broken. Unless there is general agreement on

918-644: The Charter undermined the principle of parliamentary supremacy , which until that time had always been a core feature of every government practising the Westminster system . Through section 2 of the Canada Act 1982 , the United Kingdom ended its involvement with further amendments to the Canadian constitution. Amendments to the Constitution now must be made under the various amending formulas set out in Part V of

972-524: The Governor of Tasmania rejected the advice of his Premier to appoint the leader of the opposition as Premier because he felt the advice was tendered in bad faith. The Premier went on to form a new government. Under the 1925 Chilean Constitution , the president was elected by an absolute majority of the popular vote; if no candidate won an absolute majority, the National Congress would hold

1026-594: The Heart ), 24 Conservative and 16 Labour MPs voted against the act. However, new research into documents of the Margaret Thatcher government indicate that Britain had serious concerns about the inclusion of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms within the Canada Act . Part of this concern stemmed from letters of protest the British received about it from provincial actors, but also because

1080-670: The Irish Parliament, the Oireachtas , bills pass through the following stages. Bills may be initiated in either the Dáil or the Seanad, and must pass both houses. In New Zealand, the bill passes through the following stages: A draft piece of legislation is called a bill ; when this is passed by Parliament it becomes an act and part of statute law. There are two types of bill and act, public and private . Public acts apply to

1134-574: The Magistrate's Court Act 1980 (c. 43). Until the 1980s, acts of the Australian state of Victoria were numbered in a continuous sequence from 1857; thus the Age of Majority Act 1977 was No. 9075 of 1977. Constitutional convention (political custom) A convention (also known as a constitutional convention ) is an informal and uncodified tradition that is followed by the institutions of

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1188-603: The Norwegian parliament has been very reluctant to change it. Few of the developments in the political system that have been taking place since then have been codified as amendments. This reluctance has been labelled constitutional conservatism. The two most important examples of constitutional conventions in the Norwegian political system are parliamentarism and the declining power of the King. Much of Spain's political framework

1242-752: The Parliament of Canada significant constitutional amending powers. However, with Canada's agreement at the time, under s. 7(1) of the Statute of Westminster, the British Parliament also retained the power to amend the key Canadian constitutional statutes, namely the British North America Acts . In effect, an act of the British Parliament was required to make certain changes to the Canadian constitution. Delay in

1296-647: The Senate. For example, Bill C-250 was a private member's bill introduced in the House. Bills C-1 and S-1 are pro forma bills, and are introduced at the beginning of each session in order to assert the right of each Chamber to manage its own affairs. They are introduced and read a first time, and then are dropped from the Order Paper . In the Parliament of India , every bill passes through following stages before it becomes an Act of Parliament of India : In

1350-639: The Socialist candidate Salvador Allende , a self-proclaimed Marxist , won the most votes; thus, the contingent election became a battleground between the two major powers of the Cold War , with the United States launching a campaign to prevent Allende's election by Congress while the Soviet Union gave its support to Allende. Although Allende was eventually elected at the contingent election, he

1404-580: The Study of the Law of the Constitution . Dicey wrote that in Britain, the actions of political actors and institutions are governed by two parallel and complementary sets of rules: The one set of rules are in the strictest sense "laws", since they are rules which (whether written or unwritten, whether enacted by statute or derived from the mass of custom, tradition, or judge-made maxims know [ sic ? ] as

1458-477: The United Kingdom, which lack a single overarching constitutional document, unwritten conventions are still of vital importance in understanding how the state functions. In most states, however, many old conventions have been replaced or superseded by laws (called codification ). Historical entities often had strong emphasis on constitutional convention. For example the constitution of the Roman Republic

1512-695: The addition of a Notwithstanding Clause to limit the application of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms as a result of discussions during a First Ministers' conference and other minor changes in November 1981. There was little opposition from the British government to passing the act, with 44 members of Parliament (MPs) voting against the act, less than 10 percent of the House of Commons . Citing concerns over Canada's past mistreatment of Quebec and Indigenous peoples (as recalled with frustration by Jean Chrétien in his memoirs Straight from

1566-412: The amendments which are agreed to in committee will have been tabled by the Government to correct deficiencies in the bill or to enact changes to policy made since the bill was introduced (or, in some cases, to import material which was not ready when the bill was presented). The debate on each stage is actually debate on a specific motion. For the first reading, there is no debate. For the second reading,

1620-404: The authority for amending the Constitution of Canada to the federal and provincial governments. After unpromising negotiations with the provincial governments, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau announced that the federal government would unilaterally patriate the Constitution from Britain. Manitoba, Newfoundland and Quebec responded by posing references to the provincial courts of appeal, challenging

1674-416: The breach, the person who breaches a convention is often heavily criticised, on occasions leading to a loss of respect or popular support. No convention is absolute; all but one (the second) of the above conventions were disregarded in the leadup to or during the constitutional crisis of 1975 . Ignoring constitutional conventions does not always result in a crisis. After the 2010 Tasmanian state election ,

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1728-423: The calendar year, with the first act passed being chapter 1, and so on. In the United Kingdom, legislation has referenced by year and chapter number since 1963 ( Acts of Parliament Numbering and Citation Act 1962 ). Each act is numbered consecutively based on the date it received royal assent, for example the 43rd act passed in 1980 would be 1980 chapter 43. The full reference includes the (short) title and would be

1782-469: The common law) are enforced by the courts. ... The other set of rules consist of conventions, understandings, habits, or practices that—though they may regulate the conduct of the several members of the sovereign power, the Ministry, or other officials—are not really laws, since they are not enforced by the courts. This portion of constitutional law may, for the sake of distinction, be termed

1836-528: The constitution. The act also formally ended the "request and consent" provisions of the Statute of Westminster 1931 in relation to Canada, whereby the British parliament had a general power to pass laws extending to Canada at its own request. Annexed as Schedule B to the act is the text of the Constitution Act, 1982 , in both of Canada's official languages (i.e. English and French ). Because of

1890-410: The constitutional lawyer. What conventions do is to prescribe the way in which legal powers shall be exercised. Some conventions have the effect of transferring effective power from the legal holder to another official or institution. Other conventions limit an apparently broad power, or even prescribe that a legal power shall not be exercised at all. Constitutional conventions arise when the exercise of

1944-548: The federal government's power to seek unilateral amendments from Britain. In September 1981, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Patriation Reference that provincial consent was not legally necessary, but to do so without substantial consent would be contrary to a longstanding constitutional convention . Trudeau succeeded in convincing nine provinces out of ten to consent to patriation by agreeing to

1998-417: The federal level and mostly so at the cantonal and communal level. Mostly, they aim to reconcile the democratic principle of majority rule with the need to achieve consensus in a nation that is much more heterogeneous in many respects than other nation-states. While the United Kingdom does not have a written constitution that is a single document, the collection of legal instruments that have developed into

2052-475: The following stages: There are special procedures for emergency bills, member's bills (similar to private member's bills in the UK Parliament), committee bills, and private bills. In Singapore, the bill passes through these certain stages before becoming into an Act of Parliament. Acts passed by the Parliament of England did not originally have titles, and could only be formally cited by reference to

2106-457: The formal constitution often confers wide discretionary powers on the head of state that, in practice, are used only on the advice of the head of government , and in some cases not at all. Some constitutional conventions operate separately from or alongside written constitutions, such as in Canada since the country was formed with the enactment of the Constitution Act, 1867 . In others, notably

2160-534: The government. This will usually happen following the publication of a " white paper ", setting out the issues and the way in which the proposed new law is intended to deal with them. A bill may also be introduced into parliament without formal government backing; this is known as a private member's bill . In territories with a multicameral parliament, most bills may be first introduced in any chamber. However, certain types of legislation are required, either by constitutional convention or by law, to be introduced into

2214-469: The legal rules." More precisely, the conventions make certain acts, which would be permissible under a straightforward reading of the law, impermissible in practice. The court ruled that this conflict between convention and law means that no convention, no matter how well-established or universally accepted, can "crystallize" into law, unless the relevant parliament or legislature enacts a law or constitutional amendment codifying that convention. This principle

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2268-413: The ministry of Robert Peel to govern without the support of a majority in the House, in 1834–1835 . Constitutional conventions are not, and cannot be, enforced by courts of law. The primary reason for this, according to the Supreme Court of Canada in its 1981 Patriation Reference , is that, "They are generally in conflict with the legal rules which they postulate and the courts may be bound to enforce

2322-456: The monarch of any of the other Commonwealth realms . Canada, like other Commonwealth realms, retains the King as head of state . Act of Parliament A draft act of parliament is known as a bill . In other words, a bill is a proposed law that needs to be discussed in the parliament before it can become a law. In territories with a Westminster system , most bills that have any possibility of becoming law are introduced into parliament by

2376-559: The motion is "That this bill be now read a second time and be referred to [name of committee]" and for third reading "That this bill be now read a third time and pass." In the Committee stage, each clause is called and motions for amendments to these clauses, or that the clause stand part of the bill are made. In the Report stage, the debate is on the motions for specific amendments. Once a bill has passed both Houses in an identical form, it

2430-401: The new amending formula, ending any role for the British Parliament in Canadian law, and implemented the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms . The monarch's constitutional powers and roles over Canada were not affected by the act. Canada has complete sovereignty as an independent country, however, and the King's role as monarch of Canada is separate from his role as the British monarch or

2484-426: The parliamentary session in which they were passed, with each individual act being identified by year and chapter number. Descriptive titles began to be added to the enrolled acts by the official clerks, as a reference aid; over time, titles came to be included within the text of each bill. Since the mid-nineteenth century, it has also become common practice for acts to have a short title , as a convenient alternative to

2538-470: The patriation of the Canadian constitution was due in large part to the lack of agreement concerning a method for amending the constitution that would be acceptable to all of the provinces, particularly Quebec. The Canada Act 1982 was passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom in response to the request from the Canadian Senate and House of Commons to end Britain's authority and transfer

2592-482: The power to legislate for Canada, and Canada was thus still legally a self-governing British dominion. The Statute of Westminster 1931 restricted the British Parliament's power to legislate for Canada, unless the Dominion requested and consented to Imperial legislation. This had the effect of increasing Canada's sovereignty. The British North America (No. 2) Act, 1949 , was also passed by the British Parliament, giving

2646-733: The requirements of official bilingualism , the body of the Canada Act itself is also set out in French in Schedule A to the act, which is declared by s. 3 to have "the same authority in Canada as the English version thereof". Canada's modern political history as a union of previously separate provinces began with the British North America Act, 1867 (officially called the Constitution Act, 1867, in Canada). This act combined

2700-477: The same version of the bill. Finally, the approved bill receives assent; in most territories this is merely a formality and is often a function exercised by the head of state . In some countries, such as in France, Belgium, Luxembourg , Spain and Portugal, the term for a bill differs depending on whether it is initiated by the government (when it is known as a "draft"), or by the parliament (a "proposition", i.e.,

2754-477: The sometimes lengthy main titles. The Short Titles Act 1892 , and its replacement the Short Titles Act 1896 , gave short titles to many acts which previously lacked them. The numerical citation of acts has also changed over time. The original method was based on the regnal year (or years) in which the relevant parliamentary session met. This has been replaced in most territories by simple reference to

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2808-573: The whole of the UK or a number of its constituent countries – England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Private acts are local and personal in their effect, giving special powers to bodies such as local authorities or making exceptions to the law in particular geographic areas. In the United Kingdom Parliament, each bill passes through the following stages: In the Scottish Parliament, bills pass through

2862-583: Was codified comparatively late in its development and relied for its functioning on traditions and a shared moral code called mos maiorum . In the Holy Roman Empire such important issues as who could elect the emperor were entirely uncodified before the Golden Bull of 1356 and remained subject to a certain degree of interpretation well afterwards. The term was first used by British legal scholar A. V. Dicey in his 1883 book, Introduction to

2916-436: Was later overthrown by the military in 1973 ; under the military regime of Augusto Pinochet , which succeeded Allende, a new constitution was adopted in 1980, which replaced the contingent election with a runoff by popular vote , rendering the convention obsolete. There is a convention that the Prime Minister of New Zealand should not ask for an early election unless they are unable to maintain confidence and supply . By

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