I consulted Rabinder Singh QC and Jessica Simor of Matrix Chambers, very much leaders in this field.

What happened:

1. February to April - The two sides exchanged documents and copied them to the court, setting out their arguments. These included the government’s response to my “letter before claim”, our “statement of facts and grounds of claim”, and the other side’s response to that, in which it submitted that my claim was not properly arguable.

Letter before Claim to Prime Minister
Government response to letter before claim
My ‘Statement of Facts and Grounds of Claim’
Other side's response

2. 2 May - Permission for a judicial review granted, as the judge held that my claim was indeed arguable.
   Permission Hearing Judgement

3. 19 May - The Speaker intervened.
   

4. 10 June - The hearing of the judicial review by the Divisional Court finished.
   

5. 12 June - The Irish voted, in a referendum, not to ratify the Lisbon Treaty. This should have killed the treaty, but the EU will try to find a way round it, and the UK government on 16 July ratified the treaty, in breach of a very clearly implied undertaking not to do so before the hearing of my application (see below) on 18 July. It was morally disgraceful for the government to ratify the treaty before the final result of my action was known.
   

6. 18 June - The Lisbon Treaty bill received Royal Assent. This did NOT mean that the UK had ratified the Treaty – see below.

7. 19/20 June - The Treasury solicitors sent a letter to the judge presiding over my case, saying that the government was proceeding to ratify the treaty notwithstanding that judgment had not yet been given. My solicitor sent a reply saying how disappointed and dismayed I was by the attitude of the government and that I thought it showed disrespect to the court. The court on 20 June gave extremely strong Directions on the matter, plainly indicating that it would not permit ratification before the court’s judgment had been delivered.
   Letter from the Treasury Solicitors
   Response letter
   Directions

8. 25 June - Judgment was given. I lost (see the judgment) and the Divisional Court refused me permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal. This is not unusual and I informed the government that I would apply to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal. I asked the government for an assurance that it would not meanwhile perform the final act of ratification i.e. deposit the instruments of ratification in Rome. They refused to give that assurance but on 3 July their solicitor wrote “…..My clients’ view is that the most sensible course of action will be for the Court of Appeal to first hear your client’s application for permission to appeal, and if that is successful it should then go on to consider the issue of any interim relief [meaning, of course, whether the government should be requested not to ratify until any appeal had been heard].
   Judgment

9. 16 July - The government performed the final act of ratification at noon on 16 July, in spite of what they had said in their 3 July letter.

10. 18 July - At the hearing in the High Court I was refused permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal. That is the end of the case.

One more point: solicitors for the Prime Minister refused, on technical legal grounds, to produce documents which would, I feel sure, show that the only reason he is refusing a referendum is that he believes that he would lose it.