Sources of Scots Business Law

Legislation is a law that has been produced by a governing body in order to regulate, to authorize, to sanction, to grant to declare or to restrict. Legislation can also defined as making a new law (legislation). Parliament is responsible for approving new laws, or changes to existing law, but they can originate from an MP, lord or even a member of the public or private group. Before they can become law, both the House of Commons and House of Lords must debate and vote/ Laws begin as ideas. First, a representative sponsors a bill. The bill is then assigned to a committee for study. If released by the committee, the bill is put on a calendar to be voted on, debated or amended. If the bill passes by simple majority (218 of 435), the bill moves to the Senate. In the Senate, the bill is assigned to another committee and, if released, debated and voted on. Again, a simple majority (51 of 100) passes the bill. Finally, a conference committee made of House and Senate members works out any differences between the House and Senate versions of the bill. The resulting bill returns to the House and Senate for final approval. The Government Printing Office prints the revised bill in a process called enrolling. The President has 10 days to sign or veto the enrolled bill/ The House of Representatives also has six non-voting members that represent Puerto Rico, the District of Colombia and four other American territories. The 435 voting member seats are distributed across the 50 states by population density. Members are elected every two years. The leader of the House is called the Speaker of the House and is elected by the members. The Speaker is third in line to the presidency. The leader of the Senate is the Vice-President of the United Kingdom. Each part of the legislative branch has different responsibilities. The House can elect the president in the event of a tie, introduce revenue-generating bills and impeach federal officials. The Senate can ratify treaties, except trade treaties which also must be approved by the House. It can also try federal impeachment cases referred by the House and confirm appointments to office suggested by the president. Combined as the Congress, the legislative branch of government has to approve bills in order for them to become law/The judiciary is the branch of government that deals with interpretation of a nation’s laws, resolution of legal conflicts, and judgments for violations of the law. The judiciary, also known as the judicial system, is composed of judges and courts. The judicial system is deliberately kept separate from the nation’s legislative body, such as a parliament or congress, which creates or abolishes the nation’s laws as part of the political process. Attorneys are specialists who study the law in order to help clients navigate the judicial system/The United Kingdom has three different judicial systems one for England and Wales, another for Scotland and a third for Northern Ireland. Here’s some basic information about each system and how it affects you. The Scottish Executive Justice Department oversees issues involving civil and criminal law. The Scottish Parliament makes laws on issues where it has the right to act independently. In those matters, it can change or reject acts of the UK Parliament, and pass new, separate legislation for Scotland/ The branch of federal and state government that is broadly responsible for implementing, supporting, and enforcing the laws made by the legislative branch and interpreted by the judicial branch. At the state level, the executive includes governors and their staffs. At the federal level, the executive includes the president, the vice president, staffs of appointed advisers (including the cabinet), and a variety of departments and agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Postal Service (see postmaster general). The executive branch also proposes a great deal of legislation to Congress and appoints federal judges, including justices of the Supreme Court. Although the executive branch guides the nation's domestic and foreign policies, the system of checks and balances works to limit its power/ a supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, apex court, and highest court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of a supreme court are not subject to further review by any other court. Supreme courts typically function primarily as appellate courts, hearing appeals from decisions of lower trial courts, or from intermediate-level appellate courts/ European Union law is a body of treaties and legislation, such as Regulations and Directives, which have direct effect or indirect effect on the laws of European Union member states. The three sources of European Union law are primary law, secondary law and supplementary law. The main sources of primary law are the Treaties establishing the European Union. Secondary sources include regulations and directives which are based on the Treaties. The legislature of the European Union is principally composed of the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, which under the Treaties may establish secondary law to pursue the objective set out in the Treaties. European Union law is applied by the courts of member states and the Court of Justice of the European Union. Where the laws of member states provide for lesser rights European Union law can be enforced by the courts of member states. In case of European Union law which should have been transposed into the laws of member states, such as Directives, the European Commission can take proceedings against the member state under the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The European Court of Justice (part of the Court of Justice of the European Union) is the highest court able to interpret European Union law. Supplementary sources of European Union law include case law by the Court of Justice, international law and general principles of European Union law/ when the UK jointed the EU it was then called the European Economic Community (EEC) and had six members, France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. It has since expanded to 27 members: the original six and Ireland, UK, Denmark, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Austria, Finland, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, and Romania/ A "regulation" is a binding legislative act. It must be applied in its entirety across the EU. For example, when the EU wanted to protect the names of agricultural products coming from certain areas such as Parma ham, the Council adopted a regulation. A "directive" is a legislative act that sets out a goal that all EU countries must achieve. However, it is up to the individual countries to decide how. This was the case with the working time directive, which stipulates that too much overtime work is illegal. The directive sets out minimum rest periods and a maximum number of working hours, but it is up to each country to devise its own laws on how to implement this. A treaty is an agreement under international law entered into by actors in international law, namely sovereign states and international organizations. A treaty may also be known as an (international) agreement, protocol, covenant, convention, pact, or exchange of letters, among other terms/ The Parliament of Nauru can be described as a Westminster-style Parliament, in the sense that Nauru has an essentially parliamentary-style government, where government is formed by a majority of members of Parliament and government sits in Parliament. However, the Parliament of Nauru differs in some important respects from the British Parliament at Westminster. Some of the most significant differences are: that the powers of the Parliament of Nauru are expressly limited by a written constitution, and that many of the conventions or customary practices that apply in the British Parliament at Westminster, particularly those that are intertwined with the two party political system, do not apply in Nauru/ Delegation is a common practice in contracts law. Delegation occurs when a party to the contract transfers the responsibility and authority for performing a particular contractual duty to another party. Delegation doesn't involve the transfer of contractual rights. Delegation, on the other hand, involves only a portion of the contract. With delegation, a particular contractual task or activity is transferred. Delegation means that an obligation is transferred, but no rights are transferred. The party making the delegation is called the delegator. The party receiving the delegation is the delegatee. The delegatee doesn't assume responsibility for the entire contract or receive the benefits of the contract. Therefore, the delegatee doesn't step into the shoes of the delegator. Case Law is the decisions, interpretations made by judges while deciding on the legal issues before them which are considered as the common law or as an aid for interpretation of a law in subsequent cases with similar conditions. Case laws are used by advocates to support their views to favor their clients and also it influence the decision of the judges/ One of the two major legal systems of the modern Western world (the other is civil law), it originated in the UK and is now followed in most English speaking countries. Initially, common law was founded on common sense as reflected in the social customs. Over the centuries, it was supplanted by statute law (rules enacted by a legislative body such as a Parliament) and clarified by the judgments of the higher courts (that set a precedent for all courts to follow in similar cases). These precedents are recognized, affirmed, and enforced by subsequent court decisions, thus continually expanding the common law. In contrast to civil law (which is based on a rigid code of rules), common law is based on broad principles. And whereas every defendant who enters a criminal trial under civil law is presumed guilty until proven innocent, under common law he or she is presumed innocent until proven guilty.