Royal instructions

Royal instructions^[1] are formal instructions issued to Governors of the United Kingdom's colonial dependencies. They have also been issued to the Governor General of certain Commonwealth realms.

Traditionally the royal instructions were issued to a Governor to:

• tell him how the Executive Council and Legislative Council were to be constituted, how their procedure was to be regulated, and how he was to work with them
• set out the how legislation was to be framed
• instruct him as to which classes of legislation he must refuse his assent
• regulate precedence
• set out how copies of certain formal documents and records were to be communicated to the British government

Initially the form of royal instructions remained essentially unchanged after the development of responsible government. Detailed criticism in 1876 by Edward Blake (Canada's federal Minister of Justice) of the wording of both the letters patent appointing the Governor General of Canada and the royal instructions issued to him led to changes to both sets of instruments for each of the dominions, to better reflect how they were actually governed.

1. ^ Note that this term is always used in the plural.