Statute law and delegated legislation
Although the courts are still developing the common law, the main sources of English law are now statutes and delegated legislation.
Statutes, as their alternative name Acts of Parliament makes plain, are made by Parliament itself.
However, in a modern, fast-moving and complex society, Parliament cannot possibly generate all the legislation that is needed. Therefore many statutes delegate to other people or bodies (typically, but by no means exclusively, Secretaries of State and local authorities) the power to make a great deal of detailed law in order to supplement that which is contained in the statutes themselves. Delegated legislation takes many forms, but the most common are statutory instruments (which are usually made by Secretaries of State) and byelaws and compulsory purchase orders (both of which are usually made by local authorities).Statutes, along with certain Orders made by the Privy Council when exercising the Royal Prerogative on behalf of the Crown (but not enactments of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly) are called primary legislation. Laws made by people or bodies acting under authority conferred on them by Parliament are called, variously and interchangeably, secondary, subordinate or delegated legislation. Only statutes come within the doctrine of the legislative supremacy of Parliament, for the very simple reason that they are the only form of legislation made by Parliament.
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