I must say its rather amusing to see the very American style hyper legalistic logic applied to most parliamentary democracies. According to the very letter of the law, the queen could become absolute ruler over Canada aswell :).

All hail Empress Elizabeth II, terror of all the known world?

Laws and customs only mean as much as a government willing to be responsible to the people, as the NSA has shown everyone.

> I must say its rather amusing to see the very American style hyper legalistic logic applied to most parliamentary democracies

You would be quite mistaken to believe such hyper-legalistic logic only came into existence with The United States. The US only built on the myriad of legalese already put in place by the British, Byzantines[1], Romans, and Greeks, <insert dominate culture/country of the era>.

How do you think Julius Caesar came to power? He abused the laws put in place by the Roman Republic by refusing to step down at the end of his term.

[1] The Byzantines themselves[2] have become synonymous with "complex political system"

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantinism

> According to the very letter of the law, the queen could become absolute ruler over Canada aswell :). All hail Empress Elizabeth II, terror of all the known world?

You are more correct than you could ever possibly imagine.

And the Queen of England can dissolve the parliament. It's a pretty strong thing to do, but she is absolutely able to.

The precedent for this was set in Australia in 1975, and certainly other places before that.

The dismissal of parliament in 1975 Australia was done by the Governor-General, who is the Queen's representative in Australia.

The Queen herself did nothing.

That's a semantic difference. The Governor-General acts on behalf of the Queen, and holds the perogative of the monarch in the dominion.

> That's a semantic difference.

It certainly is. The syntax of the Australian Constitution sits firmly within British conventions of monarchical behaviour, buttressed by the Acts of Westminster and the Australia Acts.

We are an independent nation in custom and law. If Her Majesty tried to do anything, she would be ignored. If she sued, the High Court would politely explain that her role is entirely ceremonial and that Parliament is the supreme source of executive and legal power in Australia.

The principle that Parliament is supreme over Crown was established in British law before Australia was colonised. It's pretty well-accepted at this point that the royals have no power.

Not sure where you're going with this? The Queen did dissolve parliament and wasn't ignored?

The Queen did not dissolve Parliament. (Neither did the Governor-General during the Whitlam dismissal.)

The Queen has never, and cannot, do so in right of Australia, because her powers are irrevocably and excludably delegated to the Australian Governor-General.

In terms of dissolving any Parliament nominally under her sovereignty, it can only be done by the Queen or a Governor-General upon advice. The Queen can't do it of her own initiative. Neither can the Governor-General. They have to be told to do it by the Government of the day.

Technically she can't, she'd have to do it as the Queen of Canada :)

Good point. She's also not the Queen of England any more anyway.

Use of the incredibly contentious notwithstanding clause is in no way moving some punctuation marks: It is an extraordinary action, having never been used by the federal government. So no, in the context of what I said they can't.

From a political standpoint, absolutely it's extraordinary; from a legal standpoint it's relatively simple, just needing a majority vote. I'd be very surprised if they did invoke it, but prostitution is something a lot of Canadians (especially conservatives) feel pretty strongly about.

(And mainly, I was just trying to bring up an interesting legal quirk of our constitution, since it's fairly unusual and most of HN's audience might not be aware of it).