Unit countries and cities

Note: important distinction.
While Parliament cannot act outside the law as it is the supreme maker of law, the government can do so. This was shown in January 2017, when the Supreme Court ruled that the Government's decision to short-circuit parliamentary scrutiny in preparing a Brexit agreement was unconstitutional.



Common Law and the constitution
After Parliament, the other great base of the United Kingdom's uncodified constitution is "Common Law". Great Britain does not have a "penal code" nor a "civil code"; its "Common Law" is the fruit of centuries of jurisprudence, that is based on historic principles of "natural law" (moral law, founded on historically accepted basic principles of right and wrong) . Common Law, though based on the principle of "precedent", can change at any moment, as it is determined by judges; for this reason, it evolves slowly to reflect changes in society and social norms. It cannot evolve in a manner that is in contradiction with social norms or parliamentary law, as any controversial verdict based on common law would be challenged in the courts of appeal.