Sophy Ridge on Sunday Interview with Gina Miller

ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO SKY NEWS, SOPHY RIDGE ON SUNDAY

NIALL PATERSON: The campaigner who took the government to court and won the right for Parliament to trigger Article 50 is today announcing that she has reassembled her legal team. Gina Miller says that if Boris Johnson becomes Prime Minister and tries to suspend Parliament to deliver a no deal Brexit, she’ll be taking the government to court once again and Gina Miller joins me now in the studio. A very good morning to you.

GINA MILLER: Good morning.

NP: Explain the rationale behind this. You had success of course with your legal case compelling the government to legislate to trigger Article 50, what is it about the power of a Prime Minister to prorogue Parliament that you see a problem with?

GINA MILLER: Well the same legal team that won in court for me have come together and we have been talking about this because the meeting of prorogation has been sort of, and you forget that it was actually Dominic Raab who brought it up in early June, and since then we have been looking at this and actually we think that it’s beyond the Prime Minister’s powers because Parliamentary sovereignty is actually the jewel in the constitutional crown and to bypass this, to close the doors of Parliament, we feel at the case we’ve looked at, the case law we’ve looked at, that that would be a beyond a Prime Minister’s powers, it would be an abuse of his powers to close Parliament to get through or to not get through, to limit the voice of the representatives that we all elect.

NP: Convince people watching this morning that this isn’t just another Remainer attempt to thwart Brexit.

GINA MILLER: I think that in the environment we’re in at the moment everything is being made into a political football and this is not. This is very much about defending the central core of our constitution which is that Parliament is sovereign and actually everybody, including the …

NP: But the Prime Minister has certain rights, certain rights including …

GINA MILLER: Of course he does.

NP: …including the ability to go to see the Queen and end Parliament.

GINA MILLER: He does do but in times of emergency. This time to actually do so for the express purpose of bypassing Parliament, to close the doors of Parliament and to limit the voice of our representatives because we are a representative democracy, would be beyond those powers in our view so our legal letter that went to Mr Johnson on Thursday was to say that if he became Prime Minister that we believe that that would be beyond his powers and also relying on the judgement in my case in 2017 where the Supreme Court expressly said that Parliament could not be bypassed.

NP: Do you think that actually you have a real chance of success at the Supreme Court, which is where this will end up or are you just making, as much as anything else, a political point?

GINA MILLER: It’s absolutely not a political point because this case, as the first case, would actually not change the outcome of Brexit, all it would do is give Parliament the voice to shape how we exit it or if we did, it would be up to Parliament to decide what it did but the fact is we cannot shut down Parliament, it is a central pillar of our constitution.

NP: I just wondered if we could have a look – and we’re grateful to you for giving us a look at the letter that you’ve sent to Boris Johnson – I wonder if we can just take a look at one of line of it here: “We request that you undertake not to advise Her Majesty the Queen should you become Prime Minister to prorogue Parliament without first providing seven days’ notice to our client.” Don’t go and see the Queen if you are Prime Minister and prorogue Parliament – I mean there will be people watching this this morning thinking ‘Who on earth do you think you are writing a letter like that to the man who will most likely be the next Prime Minister?’

GINA MILLER: Well each of us in a democracy, each of us have the right as a citizen to exercise our power … our legitimate questions of the courts and that’s what I did the first time and that’s what I’m …

NP: But it’s quite something to write a letter to a former Foreign Secretary and tell him if you become Prime Minister advise our client a week in advance if you are going to see the Queen.

GINA MILLER: Well paying lip service to Parliamentary democracy is one thing but you actually have to actively defend it and that’s what this case, my legal team and I would be doing is actively defending Parliamentary sovereignty because as I said it is the cornerstone of our constitution and to abuse that, nobody is above the law. You can be a Prime Minister, whatever your position you can argue, I would argue that no one is above the law.

NP: One thing that you are not of course is an elected representative and having been speaking to, amongst others, John Major – he’s obviously in the Upper House now but you have been speaking to John Major, you have been speaking to many Conservative MPs …

GINA MILLER: I have had no conversations and as I said, when this question was being mooted, when the prorogation question was being mooted back in June, I wrote an article then and my legal team and I have been talking and looking at the judgement in, if you like, Miller 1, the first case and looking at that judgement, going over it and seeing that actually we do have a right to bring this, to fight to say the Prime Minister wouldn’t have this power.

NP: But isn’t it fair to say that you are actually opposed to Brexit in all its forms, that this isn’t about no deal ultimately, that this is another part of a campaign from a certain part of the population who voted in a certain way to try and bring this process to a grinding halt or at the very least slow it to a point where people start to say, as some already have, do you know what, let’s just get back to the ordinary business of politics and making people’s lives better for a while?

GINA MILLER: Your last statement, getting back to people’s lives and making them better is absolutely where all of us want to be but going back on your first two questions, the first is that I have never been a fan of Brexit, I think if anything Brexit will diminish us as a country but that is completely separate, that is my personal view and that is completely different to defending the central pillar of our constitution. That is about the black and white letter of the law and I have not spoken to any Conservatives or anybody else or any other commentators and if anyone wanted to join us if we were to get to that stage, I would make absolutely certain that it was about the black and white letter of the law. There is nothing political in that letter and we have not made this about Brexit, it is about giving Parliament its voice. That is something everybody in this country should be defending.

NP: I understand that but what I’m trying to do is contextualise your personal views with the actions that you’ve been taking. Do you honestly believe that if we left the European Union without a deal that it would be impossible for the United Kingdom to recover from that? That actually we couldn’t, as so many Brexiteers say time and time again, we couldn’t be in a better position?

GINA MILLER: I’m not interested in the might be, I am very much more interested in the reality of where we are and the reality of where we are is that we have a hard deadline of 31st October, we have an extension that was agreed by our present Prime Minister Mrs May with the EU and Section 2 of that says there is no renegotiation of the Withdrawal Agreement, there is no defence in the House of comment … actually we heard today that it could have gotten worse because two members of the Conservative party have said they would cross the floor in Boris’s government so right now the problem I see is through desperation it could be that a Prime Minister, a future Prime Minister decides to prorogue Parliament because there is nowhere else to go.

NP: Do you accept any responsibility for what we both have characterised as the paralysis that’s existed in government for a while? I mean here on this show Sophy and the team have reported on problems in housing that haven’t been addressed, in education that haven’t been addressed …

GINA MILLER: But I absolutely agree with all of that.

NP: But what I’m suggesting is that yourself, the People’s Vote Campaign …

GINA MILLER: I’m not part of the People’s Vote Campaign.

NP: No, exactly, that’s why I made the distinction, but there is yourself, there is the People’s Vote Campaign, we are three years from the vote and it still hasn’t’ been done. Do you accept any responsibility for the fact that the normal business of politics is not being carried out as it should be because of this focus on trying to get Brexit through in the face of opposition from people like yourself?

GINA MILLER: Well I’m not an elected representative so I am not involved in any way in the discussions that happen in Parliament. All I did with my case was give Parliament its rightful voice and that’s what I’m talking about again but to have a conversation that’s not making everything into a political football about it is where we are as a free society. We are allowed to have opinions and debates, we’re allowed to talk about our opinions without being shut down and without being abused but those are very different when you look at it from bringing a legal case. The legal case is distinct from my view or other people’s views and I have to say – and I agree with everyone who says we have been in three years of paralysis and it is an absolute disgrace that we haven’t been more focused on an outcome and I personally put that down to the fact that we still have politicians who are lying about what’s going on.

NP: Yes or no answer if you can, if there were a snap election would you stand?

GINA MILLER: No, absolutely not.

NP: Gina Miller, thanks for joining us.