New article: Mark Elliott and Nicholas Kilford, "The Relational Principle of Parliamentary Sovereignty"
SSRN draft available to download; forthcoming in Public Law
publiclawforeveryone.com/2026/07/21/the…
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Mark Elliott
7.9K posts
Mark Elliott
@ProfMarkElliott
Professor of Public Law, University of Cambridge. Fellow, St Catharine's College, Cambridge. Author of https://t.co/aswwmsSgnC
Cambridge, UK Katılım Temmuz 2012
422 Takip Edilen33.8K Takipçiler
I am appalled to hear this. Universities ought to be places that foster and celebrate robust debate, enabling students and scholars to engage with and challenge a wide range of lawful free speech. @michaelpforan is a fine scholar, whom @UniofOxford is lucky to have on its staff.
Michael Foran@michaelpforan
Due to escalating disruptive protests, I have decided to cancel the remainder of these lectures. This is deeply lamentable, but the disruption has undermined the academic nature of this series. Students shouldn't face bullying or harassment when attending academic events.
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
This is an incredible new bursary paying tuition fees and a living allowance for an entire undergraduate degree @Catz_Cambridge for a student living in Scotland. Eligibility requirements in the link. Spread the word Scots!
St Catharine's College@Catz_Cambridge
With Highers wrapping up this week, students in Scotland have a chance to think about the future. Our Finlay Family Bursary covers undergrad tuition fees & living allowance to encourage Scottish students to apply for & take up the offer of a place at Catz: caths.cam.ac.uk/finlay-family-…
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
New #dataprotection and #commonlaw systems research position based @TrinityHallCamb & @UCamCIPIL @cambridgelaw. Do you have a relevant legal background & strong research skills? Please do apply! Deadline 22 June. Details at lnkd.in/esbVcMR6
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Ok, suppose it was “good enough” tomorrow?
What do you think is going to happen?
Students are going to keep showing up and paying?
The casual teaching staff can be sacked or cut?
The academics will just be doing research all day while the AI does pesky teaching and marking?
Mark Elliott@ProfMarkElliott
That AI isn't yet "good enough" to mark students' essays ought to be beside the point. Outsourcing such tasks to AI is fundamentally incompatible with the intellectual engagement between student and professor that should be central to higher education. /1 cam.ac.uk/stories/ai-uni…
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The prospect of AI-generated student work that is, in turn, evaluated by AI is a dystopian prospect and represents an existential threat to the sector. Universities should have the courage to recognise this and design AI policies accordingly, however unfashionable that seems. 3/3
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Academic writing isn't about producing "content". It's about thinking: grappling with ideas, refining arguments. Students should be encouraged to do that now more than ever. They are entitled, in return, to genuine intellectual encounter with a professor who marks their work. /2
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That AI isn't yet "good enough" to mark students' essays ought to be beside the point. Outsourcing such tasks to AI is fundamentally incompatible with the intellectual engagement between student and professor that should be central to higher education. /1
cam.ac.uk/stories/ai-uni…
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New post
The Prime Minister as an MP: A postscript on historical precedent and constitutional convention
publiclawforeveryone.com/2026/05/26/the…
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
🚨Could the Parliament Acts be used to pass assisted dying?
As I say in this clip:
🔵 Never previously used on a PMB
🔵 But explicitly intended to apply to PMBs, not just govt bills
🔵 In practice, not straightforward to do, but possible
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
Well it’s not everyday you receive a letter from 10 Downing Street. I’m most grateful to @middletemple for forwarding this on to me. What a great end to the week. Thank you very much for the endorsement. @Keir_Starmer @10DowningStreet
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My blog, publiclawforeveryone.com, now features "Not by AI" badging. For more information on the Not by AI initiative, see: notbyai.fyi/not-by-ai-90-r….
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
This is very interesting: a post-plagiarism conception of AI misuse that also prohibits its use for "conceptualising" and "outlining". The guiding principle – that "*thinking* remains the sine qua non of good lawyering (and of a quality legal education)" – is surely right.
Chris Hoofnagle@hoofnagle
Berkeley law has introduced a new, much stricter AI policy law.berkeley.edu/wp-content/upl…
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
Challenging sanctions: public law, Saini-style administrativecourtblog.wordpress.com/2026/05/21/cha…
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@drdeanknight Exactly. The old practices, already isolated examples 60 years ago, are artefacts of an era when attachment to now-dominant norms was less strong. But the increasingly predominant nature of commitment to relevant norms in the intervening decades confines the old egs to history.
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@ProfMarkElliott For me — like you, I think — the normative force of the constitutional reason colours the rule-of-recognition analysis. And here it’s v strong in favour of the convention as you frame it and probably trumps the spotty contra old precedents?
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Interesting piece on whether PM must be an MP, partly responding to my analysis (publiclawforeveryone.com/2026/05/14/doe…). Key Q is whether precedent from 1960s remains persuasive. I doubt it, given 60+ years of now consistent practice. Convention flexes as practice & political mores develop.
UKCLA@ukcla
Dane Luo: Andy Burnham and the Constitution – The Conventions on the Appointment of the Prime Minister ukconstitutionallaw.org/2026/05/20/dan…
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@ProfMarkElliott FWIW, New Zealand — like Scotland — has legislated that the Prime Minister (and, indeed, all ministers) must be members of Parliament.
#DLM94219" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">legislation.govt.nz/act/public/198…
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Mark Elliott retweetledi
We gave a family of ducks the VIP treatment through Main Court yesterday. Each spring ducklings hatch across Cambridge & porters guide them towards the river – a tradition that we would never want to duck out of!
Music: Fluffing a Duck" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
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