The Changing Constitution, 3d ed.

As a teacher and writer on the United Kingdom's constitutional arrangements it would not be unusual for this professional interest to become a personal interest. There is a danger that one might think such an interest is widely shared. After, all these are constitutionally interesting times in which we live, with all kinds of reforms promised by opposition parties, and some changes have actually been passed by the Conservative Party. But outside the milleu of the political elite, the broadsheet press and its electronic counterparts, and the academy, is it the case that constitutional matters are topics of debate for the population, whether at work or at home? Yes, if it is our troubled Royal Family which, through the marital difficulties of some of its members, seems to symbolise aspects of the nation.

In my Textbook on Constitutional and Administrative Law, I had endeavoured to be up to date, including material on the Northern Ireland Framework Documents, on the Nolan Committee on Standards in Public Life, and the new deregulation order procedure in Parliament. I did not think that the failure to dwell on any constitutional aspects of the relations between the separated Prince and Princess of Wales was a serious one. The …