When UK Act of Parliament refers to the Secretary of State, which exactly is meant by that? Acts of the UK Parliament often give &quot;the Secretary of State&quot; the power to make regulations, orders or other type of secondary legislation. For example, section 22(3) of the Human Rights Act 1998: The other provisions of this Act come into force on such day as the Secretary of State may by order appoint; and different days may be appointed for different purposes. But as Wikipedia says, there are currently 16 different secretaries of state in the UK. So when an Act of Parliament says just that the Secretary of State may do something, then which secretary of state may do it? Does it mean that any secretary of state may do it?
When the Act was originally passed it didn't say Secretary of State, it said &quot;Lord Chancellor&quot;. So depending on when the Act came into force fully, the current wording may be moot. The text of the Act was modified by The Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs Order 2003 to make the Secretary of State for Consitutional Affairs responsible. That office was discontinued in 2007, and the post of Secretary of State for Justice created. Not being specific in the 2003 Order allows the Prime Minister to reorganise government departments without needing to modify legislation to track the changes. Secretary of State is defined in the Interpretation Act 1978: “Secretary of State” means one of Her Majesty’s Principal Secretaries of State. So, legally, when the text of an Act isn't specific, the power isn't vested in the relevant Secretary of State but can be exercised by any of them.
Parliament in the UK is sovereign: Parliament [is] the supreme legal authority in the UK, which can create or end any law. Generally, the courts cannot overrule its legislation and no Parliament can pass laws that future Parliaments cannot change. If parliament passed a law saying that it was a crime for "a black American woman sat at the front of the bus" and provided that it repealed all existing laws that would invalidate that law (e.g. the European Charter of Human Rights); then there is no defence to that crime if the prosecution proves the elements beyond reasonable doubt i.e. that you are a) black, b) American, c) a woman and d) sat at the front of the bus. In the UK there is no higher law that can be appealed to like a constitution. Over the years, UK parliaments have passed laws limiting their sovereignty, however, any current or future parliament could (in theory) repeal those limits. Just like the USA could (also in theory) repeal the Bill of Rights amendments to their constitution (or even replace the Constitution as a whole); albeit the process is different and less likely to succeed. The limitations on this are political, not legal.
Here is a list of language-regulating bodies. There is none for English, but they exist for Spanish (Real Academia Española), French (Académie française) and Swahil (Baraza la Kiswahili la Taifa for Tanzania, Chama cha Kiswahili cha Taifa for Kenya). No language regulator addresses the issues which arise in the interaction between natural language and the needs of legal interpretation. Instead, these bodies generally strive to maintain the historical "purity" of the language. Rather than "define" a word like "sandwich", they decide whether to outlaw (or disparage) the word because it comes from English. The vast majority of language-related problems in law which arise in common-law countries pertains to characteristics of common law and the practice of establishing precedent. There are philosophical conflicts, for example between those to adhere to the text versus those who try to discern original intent. If we had an official agency that precisely defined what a "weapon" is, we would still have the struggle over interpretive philosophies which renders moot any rulings from the national language regulator. In the US, part of the problem of word-definition is the widespread practice of localized redefinition in statutes – the laws that say "In this subsection, 'weapon' has the meaning defined in 18 U.S. Code §920" (fictitious: §921 defines "firearm" undefined "weapon"). Tracking the scope of definition and range of variation of a word within a body of codified law is very difficult. The rule in common law is that words that are not statutorily defined are given their "ordinary" meaning. There is no authoritative resource for "ordinary meaning" in English (there is no such thing as "the" dictionary). In the US, it would require a constitutional amendment to immutably impose a particular dictionary standard for deriving word meaning (e.g. Webster's Fourth New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, forthcoming) and there would be ensuing political protests. A legally precise definition of "repair" would be very difficult to understand, and would require hiring a lawyer in order to engage in the activity of "repairing broken windows", from a legally-safe perspective. And that is just word meaning. Ambiguity in sentence-meaning cannot be resolved by listing the sentences.
An executor executes a will according to the wishes of the will. This involves disposition of the estate. Almost certainly the mental state of humans is not material to the disposition of the estate. I'm unclear what you even mean by executor. The named executor of a will only has power after a person dies. Was the will executed 19 years ago? If so, the executor's power is long long passed. The chance of challenging a will 19 years later is practically zero. Elder abuse will be managed by the state. An interested party may involve the state to create an investigation as to what is going on.
A person can be a shareholder or director of a UK company without being in the UK. Being a shareholder or director of a UK company does not give a person a right to be in the UK. The 3C leave extension is unrelated to this. A person with 3C leave may remain in the UK on that basis regardless of whether the person is a shareholder or director of a company. Attending "board-level meetings" is an activity that is allowed under the visitor rules, even if the director is paid (see V4.7), so one may conclude that doing so does not constitute "work." It should therefore be permitted for someone under 3C leave even if the person is not authorized to work. Doing work for the company other than attending meetings would not be permitted until the person gains authorization to work.
I think we're talking about In re Hennen, which dealt with the removal of the clerk of the district court in Louisiana: It all these departments power is given to the secretary, to appoint all necessary clerks; 1 Story, 48; and although no power to remove is expressly given, yet there can be no doubt, that these clerks hold their office at the will and discretion of the head of the department. It would be a most extraordinary construction of the law, that all these offices were to be held during life, which must inevitably follow, unless the incumbent was removable at the discretion of the head of the department: the President has certainly no power to remove. These clerks fall under that class of inferior officers, the appointment of which the Constitution authorizes Congress to vest in the head of the department. The same rule, as to the power of removal, must be applied to offices where the appointment is vested in the President alone. The nature of the power, and the control over the officer appointed, does not at all depend on the source from which it emanates. The execution of the power depends upon the authority of law, and not upon the agent who is to administer it. And the Constitution has authorized Congress, in certain cases, to vest this power in the President alone, in the Courts of law, or in the heads of departments; and all inferior officers appointed under each, by authority of law, must hold their office at the discretion of the appointing power. Such is the settled usage and practical construction of the Constitution and laws, under which these offices are held. In re Hennen, 38 U.S. 230, 259–60, 10 L. Ed. 138 (1839) (emphasis added).
This is an interesting question. Requirement to &quot;Qualify&quot; The relevant provision seems to be subsection (b) of the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 (codified at 3 USC 19. That subsection provides that: (b) If, at the time when under subsection (a) of this section a Speaker is to begin the discharge of the powers and duties of the office of President, there is no Speaker, or the Speaker fails to qualify as Acting President, then the President pro tempore of the Senate shall, upon his resignation as President pro tempore and as Senator, act as President. Thus a Speaker would not become acting President unless the Speaker &quot;qualifies&quot;. I believe this would include fulfilling all the requirements for a President, including the minimum age, and the requirement that the President be a &quot;natural born citizen&quot;. Subsection (d)(1) further provides that: If, by reason of death, resignation, removal from office, inability, or failure to qualify, there is no President pro tempore to act as President under subsection (b) of this section, then the officer of the United States who is highest on the following list, and who is not under disability to discharge the powers and duties of the office of President shall act as President: Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of Defense, Attorney General, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Commerce, Secretary of Labor, Secretary of Health and Human Services, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Secretary of Transportation, Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Education, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Secretary of Homeland Security. The Act has never been invoked, nor have either of the two prior Presidential Succession Acts, so there is no case law or precedent available. The Wikipedia article on the Act describes the history of all three versions, and the times when an invocation might have occurred. Questioned Constitutionality The Wikipedia article quotes a statement by Judge M. Miller Baker made during a September 2003 joint hearing before the U.S. Senate's Committee on Rules and Administration and Committee on the Judiciary. This statement argues that the Act as currently written is unconstitutional. The statement reads: The 1947 Act is probably unconstitutional because it appears that the Speaker of the House and the President pro tempore of the Senate are not &quot;Officers&quot; eligible to act as President within the meaning of the Succession Clause. This is because in referring to an &quot;Officer&quot;, the Succession Clause, taken in its context in Section 1 of Article II, probably refers to an &quot;Officer of the United States&quot;, a term of art under the Constitution, rather than any officer, which would include legislative and state officers referred to in the Constitution (e.g., the reference to state militia officers found in Article I, Section 8). In the very next section of Article II, the President is empowered to &quot;require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments&quot; and to appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, &quot;Officers of the United States&quot;. These are the &quot;Officers&quot; to whom the Succession Clause probably refers. This contextual reading is confirmed by Madison's notes from the Constitutional Convention, which reveal that the Convention's Committee of Style, which had no authority to make substantive changes, substituted &quot;Officer&quot; in the Succession Clause in place of &quot;Officer of the United States&quot;, probably because the Committee considered the full phrase redundant.[1] Since the Act has never been invoked, this contention has never been tested in a court. Given the 25th Amendment's provisions for filling a vacancy in the office of Vice-President, the likelihood of the act ever being invoked is much reduced. Notes [1]: &quot;Ensuring the Continuity of the United States Government: The Presidency&quot;. Prepared Statement of M. Miller Baker, Joint Hearing Before the Committee on Rules and Administration and the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate. September 16, 2003. Archived from the original on January 14, 2021. Retrieved July 11, 2018 – via GlobalSecurity.org. [This citation is copied from the Wikipedia article.]
The cited provision is: A person has the protected characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person's sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex. This language originates in the Sex Discrimination (Gender Reassignment) Regulations 1999. This statutory instrument was made in response to a 1996 decision of the European Court of Justice (P v S and Cornwall County Council, C-13/94) that Council Directive 76/207/EEC of 9 February 1976 , regarding equal treatment of men and women, also covered discrimination on the grounds of gender reassignment. The regulations were made in order to bring domestic law up to date with the EU requirement, by amending the Sex Discrimination Act 1975. The definition at the time, found in the amended section 82, was: &quot;gender reassignment&quot; means a process which is undertaken under medical supervision for the purpose of reassigning a person’s sex by changing physiological or other characteristics of sex, and includes any part of such a process So the idea of &quot;other characteristics&quot; or &quot;other attributes&quot; comes from the 1999 version of the law. I expect that the change to &quot;attributes&quot; is simply because the Equality Act 2010 uses the term &quot;characteristic&quot; to mean something else, as it consolidates many different regimes about discrimination on the basis of sex, race, disability, etc., all of which are called &quot;characteristics&quot;. The more recent text removes the part about &quot;medical supervision&quot;, and explicitly includes people at any stage of transition. Explanatory Notes to the 2010 Act give the example: A person who was born physically female decides to spend the rest of her life as a man. He starts and continues to live as a man. He decides not to seek medical advice as he successfully ‘passes’ as a man without the need for any medical intervention. He would have the protected characteristic of gender reassignment for the purposes of the Act. (These notes are not binding in law but they do give a good idea of what the drafters meant to say. The concept of 'passes' is also not the most sensitive language to bring in, since trans people do not necessarily want to measure themselves by their ability to pass undetected, and may present differently in different contexts.) The example shows that someone can have the protected characteristic without having, or contemplating, any change to their body. So from this example, the other attributes of sex would include all those ways in which the man &quot;continues to live as a man&quot;. From general knowledge of trans men, that could include using a masculine name and pronouns; wearing traditionally-male clothes; wearing a binder, baggy clothing, padding in the crotch, or other ways to suggest a more masculine than feminine body; having a traditionally-male haircut; using traditionally-masculine body language; pitching the voice lower; and so on. The situation for trans women would be parallel. These things are all attributes of sex, in that our society abounds in stereotypes of what is a &quot;manly handshake&quot;, or a &quot;girly drink&quot;, or otherwise associated with a particular sex. They are to do with behaviour more than the body.