Part of High Hedges (No. 2) Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 2:45 pm on 7 May 2003.
Bob Russell
Liberal Democrat, Colchester
2:45,
7 May 2003
On that last point, which part of a local authority would be held responsible for dealing with such matters? The hon. Gentleman has just referred to the planning Laws, and he spoke earlier of public health matters. Will the council be dealing with the problem as an environmental matter or a planning matter? Does he have a view on which it ought to be?
A parliamentary bill is divided into sections called clauses.
Printed in the margin next to each clause is a brief explanatory `side-note' giving details of what the effect of the clause will be.
During the committee stage of a bill, MPs examine these clauses in detail and may introduce new clauses of their own or table amendments to the existing clauses.
When a bill becomes an Act of Parliament, clauses become known as sections.
Laws are the rules by which a country is governed. Britain has a long history of law making and the laws of this country can be divided into three types:- 1) Statute Laws are the laws that have been made by Parliament. 2) Case Law is law that has been established from cases tried in the courts - the laws arise from test cases. The result of the test case creates a precedent on which future cases are judged. 3) Common Law is a part of English Law, which has not come from Parliament. It consists of rules of law which have developed from customs or judgements made in courts over hundreds of years. For example until 1861 Parliament had never passed a law saying that murder was an offence. From the earliest times courts had judged that murder was a crime so there was no need to make a law.
