Scenario where the Queen is involved in ‘showdown’

MPS SEEKING to delay or stop Brexit risk breaking their “sacred duty” not to involve the Queen in politics, the Government’s former top constitutional lawyer has warned. Sir Stephen Laws QC said any moves to act without the consent of the Government would risk involving the monarch in “a legislative showdown” between the Commons and Theresa May’s executive.

He said it could give rise to a scenario where Ministers advise the Queen, the “ultimate referee”, to withhold “Royal Assent” from any Bill, which has not happened in more than 300 years.

Writing for the Policy Exchange think-tank, he said if MPs, with the help of Speaker John Bercow, were able to get a Bill through the Commons against the Prime Minister’s wishes, it could lead to “potentially horrific, constitutional consequences”.

He added: “It is a sacred duty of all UK politicians not to involve the monarch in politics. They have a constitutional responsibility to resolve difficulties between themselves in accordance with the rules, and so as not to call on the ultimate referee.

“However, might not a government in that situation think this was precisely the last resort for which the Royal Assent process is retained? How should the monarch react to such advice? The answer is not straightforward, and the prospect of it needing to be considered in a real-life political crisis is unthinkably awful.”

The last monarch to withhold Royal Assent from a Bill, preventing it from becoming law, was Queen Anne in 1707.