An interesting article in the Independent titled: Brown may bring in written constitution . Britain's constitution is a non-written one, unlike America's and Australia's. Britain has non-contiguous acts which make up what would be called a constitution, but they are not in one entrenched or statutory act. A written constitution would bring Britain into line with modern constitutional practice.

A common aspect of modernising Westminster systems has been creating a unitary constitutional document. Australia went along that path with federalisation, creating an entrenched constitution. New South Wales and Victoria also have single constitution, but not with all part entrenched. Queensland and Canada have both been recent Westminster system which updated their constitutions to the Washington style (it should be noted some Greek city-states from antiquity had written constitutions, so it wasn't an American invention).

However, the Australian states of Tasmania, Western Australia and South Australia all have unwritten constitutions - as does New Zealand. In fact, IIRC, Tasmania and Western Australia share a founding British Act as their first constitutional legislation.

The biggest and best known Westminster system is the British Parliament. When the British Empire decided having an agrarian empire was too costly, it started exporting responsible government to its colonies. Centralised control of America led to revolution, but local self-government, rather than colonial Naval Governorships, aided the political growth of colonies such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

Unwritten constitutions are largely based on convention and precedent, which means their institutions do not change much. For instance a House of Lords still appears in the British system, and due to its non-democratic nature proves to be a constant temptation for corruption - witness Blair's peerage scandal. Unwritten constitutions also build up bizarre absurdities as conventions arise organically rather than constitutional or statutory law. A good example of this is Taking The Chiltern Hundreds .

From the article:

The Chancellor, who will launch his campaign for the Labour leadership today, will promise to make constitutional reform a priority. He wants to bring in a "new politics" as he tries to repair the damage after Mr Blair was accused of taking Britain to war in Iraq on a false prospectus.

A written constitution could spell out the respective powers of the Government and Parliament, boosting the ability of the Commons to hold ministers to account and, for example, being guaranteed a vote before military action. The blueprint could also outline the rights and responsibilities of individual citizens.

Will the constitutional rigour of a single document lead to Britain having a Bill of Rights? Really; no modern constitution and and no political system that operates as a market-state is complete without one. Australia's reason for not having one is executive selfishness, the Westminster system gives way too much power to the executive and a bill of rights is negative and restrictive to government action.

Anthony Barnett asked the six candidates for deputy leadership of the British Labour Party their opinion on a written constitution. He got full replies on open democracy. The questions are excellent and the replies, for the most part, are straight forward.

Hazel Blears comes off worst in the answers. She argues against a written constitution as it gives too much power to judges, who come from a 'narrow strata' of society. This is false. Judges are given tenure as specialists based on merit in a republican system.

Britain's constitution is part written in statutes and partly maintained through custom and convention. The judicial plays exactly the same role as in a written system, just that the constitution is harder to amend in a written one.

Activist judges are a problem, but they are exposed as activists because of the clarity a written constitution provides.

There is still the issue of constitutional law and practise being developed outside of the written constitution itself, and ended up an aggregate of constitutional allowances, but in most cases, such as Income Tax and Workchoices, it is Parliament that is taking advantage of that activism and not relinquishing their new judicially won powers.

It is as much a failure of Parliament as the High Court. An unwritten constitution will not change that, and if anything, an unwritten constitution is far easier to change statutorially and by breaking convention - especially in an emergency - which is usually when constitutional bounds are expanded.

Blears also states that she is 'at heart a unicameralist'. A parliament with one body is probably the worst of all structures. Great for the executive in a Westminster system, but bad for governance. The unicameralist parliament in Australia managed to produce the unchecked excesses of Joh Bjelke-Peterson.

One of the purposes of a written constitution is to restrict government through clear law, that is higher than statute, meaning government cannot amend it without a referendum or public will (though NSW has only parts of its constitution entrenched).

The constitutional law and organisation structures are design to expose tyranny quickly, and to recover from a tyrannical government or action with haste. Unicameralism is very weak in this area.

The answers by the other candidates on the purpose of a written constitution did not touch this issue. Most of the answers were that the written constitution handed power to individuals and the community. For instance Peter Hain:

Yes - as a way of handing more power down to individuals and local communities, and entrenching democratic rights and accountability.

Presumably his view of a constitution is one that Parliament cannot amend at whim, which means the entire document will be entrenched and only modified by referendum.

From the comment Hain sees a written constitution as being synonymous with a Bill of Rights. This is a very modern republican view of a constitution - which in republican doctrine is incomplete without constitutional liberties that the legislative and executive cannot intrude into.

The third aspect of his statement is that he appears to see the written constitution as a chance for organisational renewal. The House of Lords is an undemocratic body in British system. He answers in another question:

I am in favour of replacing the House of Lords with a fully, democratically elected Senate, with powers to revise but not block legislation so that the primacy of the House of Commons is not undermined.

Hain's does not mention how the Monarchy fits into his comment, in what is a very republican statement. Others answered on the House of Lords that it should not be able to amend bills or veto a bill from the House of Commons.

Anthony Barnett is to be congratulated for asking good questions, and the candidates for their replies. Very interesting.