The Assessment Task

This assignment requires you to apply your knowledge and understanding of constitutional conventions to a current constitutional event, ie a situation where a Minister may have breached a constitutional convention. The assignment requires you to identify and apply the relevant convention, as well as the potential consequences for the Minister of any breach.

Your briefing is 1,000 words, which should be written in bullet point format. Communicating your points as clearly and succinctly as possible is key to covering what you need to address within the word allowance.

Choose ONE of the Ministerial situations below and see the Instructions which follow:

Ministerial situations

1.Dominic Cummings, Special Advisor to the Prime Minister: If Dominic Cummings had been a government Minister when he allegedly broke the national Lockdown rules, should he have resigned according to constitutional conventions?

OR

2.Gavin Williamson, Minister for Education: According to constitutional conventions, should Mr. Williamson have resigned because of the Department of Education’s handling of the A level grading and results process in August 2020?

OR

3. Priti Patel, Home Secretary: Due to her treatment of civil servants within her department, should she have resigned according to constitutional conventions?

Instructions
Your briefing is to be addressed to the Minister who seeks advice on whether, in the light of their situation, they have broken a constitutional convention and if so, what the consequence could be.

Your briefing is to
Identify and briefly explain the factual situation involved (ie what has happened to raise the issue)
Identify and explain the constitutional convention relevant to the situation
Using appropriate authority, identify and explain examples relating to the constitutional convention in question in order to illustrate its operation
Apply these authorities and examples to the facts established in order to advise the Minister on whether or not (s)he has broken the constitutional convention
Identify and explain the consequence(s) for the Minister of a breach of constitutional convention

Your briefing must be properly referenced using OSCOLA.

Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this assessment, you will be able to:
a) Explain the key foundational principles, theories and/or rules underpinning UK constitutional law and the contextual factors which shape the operation of the UK’s constitution

d) Sort, order and reference material and ideas drawn from a range of sources into logical lines of argument to propose solutions to questions set

e) Effectively communicate and argue ideas in structured, well written English

f) Identify, select and justify chosen solutions to factual situations (real and hypothetical)

Your grade will depend on the extent to which you meet these learning outcomes in the way relevant for this assessment. Please see the grading rubric on NILE for further details of the criteria against which you will be assessed.

Word Limits
The maximum word limit for this assessment is 1,000 words

In accordance with the Assessment and Feedback Policy, where a submission exceeds the stipulated word limit by more than 10%, the submission will only be marked up to and including the additional 10%. Anything over this will not be included in the final grade for the assessment item. Abstracts, bibliographies, reference lists, appendices and footnotes are excluded from any word limit requirements.

In line with the same Policy, where a submission is notably under the word limit, the full submission will be marked on the extent to which the learning objectives have been met.

Assessment Support
Specific support sessions for this assessment will be provided by the module team and notified through NILE. You can also access individual support and guidance for your assessments from Library and Learning Services. Visit the Skills Hub to access this support and to discover the online support also available for assessments and academic skills.

Academic Integrity and Misconduct
Unless this is a group assessment, the work you produce must be your own, with work taken from any other source properly referenced and attributed. For the avoidance of doubt this means that it is an infringement of academic integrity and, therefore, academic misconduct to ask someone else to carry out all or some of the work for you, whether paid or unpaid, or to use the work of another student whether current or previously submitted.

For further guidance on what constitutes plagiarism, contract cheating or collusion, or any other infringement of academic integrity, please read the University’s Academic Integrity and Misconduct Policy. Also useful resources to help with understanding academic integrity are available from UNPAC .

N.B. The penalties for academic misconduct are severe and can include failing the assessment, failing the module and expulsion from the university.
Assessment Submission
To submit your work, please go to the ‘Submit your work’ area on the NILE site and use the relevant submission point to upload your report. The deadline for this is 11.59pm (UK local time) on the date of submission. Please note that essays and text based reports should be submitted as word documents and not PDFs or Mac files.

Written work submitted to TURNITIN will be subject to anti-plagiarism detection software. Turnitin checks student work for possible textual matches against internet available resources and its own proprietary database. Work

When you upload your work correctly to TURNITIN you will receive a receipt which is your record and proof of submission. If your assessment is not submitted to TURNITIN, rather than a receipt, you will see a green banner at the top of the screen that denotes successful submission.

N.B Work emailed directly to your tutor will not be marked.
Late submission of work
For first sits, if an item of assessment is submitted late and an extension has not been granted, the following will apply:

Within one week of the original deadline – work will be marked and returned with full feedback, and awarded a maximum bare pass grade.
More than one week from original deadline – grade achievable LG (L indicating late).

For resits there are no allowances for work submitted late and it will be treated as a non-submission.

Please see the Assessment and Feedback Policy for full information on the processes related to assessment, grading and feedback, including anonymous grading. You will also find the generic grading criteria for achievement at University Grading Criteria. Also explained there are the meanings of the various G grades at the bottom of the grading scale including LG mentioned above.
Extensions
The University of Northampton’s general policy with regard to extensions is to be supportive of students who have genuine difficulties, but not against pressures of work that could have reasonably been anticipated.

For full details please refer to the Extensions Policy. Extensions are only available for first sits – they are not available for resits.
Mitigating Circumstances
For guidance on Mitigating circumstances please go to Mitigating Circumstances where you will find detailed guidance on the policy as well as guidance and the form for making an application.

Please note, however, that an application to defer an assessment on the grounds of mitigating circumstances should normally be made in advance of the submission deadline or examination date.

Feedback and Grades
These can be accessed through clicking on the Feedback and Grades tab on NILE. Feedback will be provided by a rubric with summary comments.