A legal battle over Prime Minister Boris Johnson's controversial decision to suspend Parliament for five weeks is about to be heard by the UK's highest court.
The Supreme Court in London will on Tuesday start hearing appeals on two separate challenges to the prorogation of Parliament.
Johnson says the five-week suspension is to allow the government to set out a new legislative agenda in a Queen's Speech when MPs return to Parliament on October 14.
But those who brought legal challenges argue the prorogation is designed to prevent parliamentary scrutiny of the UK's impending exit from the EU on October 31.
The Supreme Court, which will sit as a panel of 11 justices for only the second time in its 10-year history, must reconcile contradictory judgments issued by the English and Scottish courts.
The High Court in London dismissed the case brought by businesswoman and campaigner Gina Miller that the length of the prorogation was "purely political".
Giving reasons for their ruling on September 11, three of the most senior judges in England and Wales said: "We concluded that the decision of the Prime Minister was not justiciable (capable of challenge). It is not a matter for the courts."
But, on the same day, an Edinburgh court ruled that Mr Johnson's decision was unlawful because "it was motivated by the improper purpose of stymying Parliament".
Lord Carloway, Scotland's most senior judge, said: "The circumstances demonstrate that the true reason for the prorogation is to reduce the time available for parliamentary scrutiny of Brexit at a time when such scrutiny would appear to be a matter of considerable importance, given the issues at stake."
Victims' campaigner Raymond McCord - who brought separate proceedings in Belfast, arguing that a no-deal Brexit would damage the Northern Ireland peace process - has also been given permission to intervene in the Supreme Court case.
In a statement ahead of the hearing, Miller said her case was about 'pushing back against what is clearly a dramatic overreach of executive power'.
"The precedent - if this is allowed to stand - is terrifying: any prime minister trying to push through a policy that is unpopular in the House and in the country at large would from now on simply be able to resort to prorogation.
She added "It is my view - and the view of a great many others - that Mr Johnson has gone too far and put our parliamentary sovereignty and democracy in grave danger by his actions."
Australian Associated Press
