2. Parliament Flashcards
Parliament
British legislature, made up of the House of Commons, House of Lords and the Monarch
House of Commons
Democratically elected upper chamber of the UK legislature
House of Lords
Unelected second chamber of the UK legislature
How many constituencies are there?
650
This means there are 650 MPs
Backbenchers
- MPs who don’t hold ministerial or shadow ministeiral positions
- Their main role is to represent their constituents
- They are also, (due to whipping), expected to support their party leaders
Opposition
- Party with the second-largest number of seats in the HoC
- It’s role is to critcse the Government and oppose legislative proposals
- It also seeks to present itself as an alternative Government
Does the HoL have an upper limit on the size of its membership?
No
How many members does the HoL have?
827
What % of HoL members are women?
29%
What % of HoC members are women?
34%
There are 3 main types of peers in the HoL.
What are they?
- Hereditary peers
- Life peers
- ‘Lord spiritual’
How many Hereditary peers are there?
92
How many ‘Lord spiritual’ members of Lords are there?
26
After the 2019 general election, what % of HoC went to Private School?
22%
After the 2019 general election, what % of HoL went to Private School?
57%
As of 2019, what % of UK population went to Private School?
7%
After the 2019 general election, what % of HoL were from minority ethnic backgrounds?
7.3%
After the 2019 general election, what % of HoC were from minority ethnic backgrounds?
10%
As of 2019, what % of the UK population were part of ethnic minority groups?
18%
What do these statistics about the makeup of each chambers show us about the representation of Parliament?
- Parliament is descriptively unrepresentative, (especially when it comes to gender, race and educational backgrounds)
- This should be seen as a major problem, as it causes the interests of marginalised sections of the population to be ignored and unrepresented in policy formation
What are the main functions of Parliament?
- Passing legislation
- Scrutinising the executive
- Providing Ministers
- Representing the electorate
How can Parliament represent the electorate?
- How democratically representative it is
- How well it represents the interests of the public
- How descriptively representative it is
How is Parliament democratically representative?
- MPs are elected on a regular basis and only represent a small number of votes
- This means voters can hold their representative accountable and can chose to remove them if they believe they are ineffective
- Each MP has to win a plurality of votes to get elected
Although the UK uses a plurality voting system, some MPs are elected with a majority.
Give an example of a time that an MP won a vote in their constituency with a majority.
Gavin Williamson won the 2019 South Staffordshire vote with a 73% majority
How is Parliament democratically unrepresentative?
- HoL is unelected, yet still holds significant powers to influence policy and scrutinise/delay legislation * However, this was limited by the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949
- Most HoL members are appointed by HoL Appointments Commision or by Party leaders at the end of a PMs time in office
- Despite attempts to make the HoL more democratic by New Labour, it is still considered undemocratic
- House of Lords reform Act 1999, was a two stage plan to remove all Hereditary peers - However, second stage never took place, so 92 of them still remain
- HoC voting system, (First Past the Post), can also be seen as unrepresentative - Ex: In 2019, the Conservative Party won 56% of seats in HoC with just 43% of the vote
The Conservative Party won the 2019 General Election.
What % of seats did they win? + What % of votes did they recieve?
They won 56% of seats, despite only receiving 43% of the vote
How does Parliament represent the interests of the public?
- Small size of constituencies coupled with the fact that MPs represent their constituents interests in Parliament
- Ex: In October 2022, 33 MPs rebelled against Liz Truss’ Government and abstained on voting on banning fracking - One of these MPs was Mark Fletcher of Bolsover - Local community had a strong movement against fracking
- HoC and HoL also reflect the public’s outrage and discontentment with political issues
- Ex: The Opposition scrutinising Johnson over the ‘partygate’ scandal, which reflected an outraged British population
How does Parliament not represent the interests of the public?
- MPs often don’t vote according to their constituency’s wishes, even if they want to
- This is because they normally vote on how they are whipped to do so - Whips ensure members of their party vote inline with the beliefs of the respective party
- This is in order to keep favour with their party, allowing them to climb the Political ladder
Overall, do Parliament represent the interests of the public?
- Parliament is only somewhat representative in this regard
- MPs do wish to represent the wishes of their constituents and the public as a whole, however, the extent to which they can do this is limited by the whipping system
- However, HoC and HoL are effective at representing the interests of the public in extreme circumstances - Which can be seen in the ‘partygate’ scandal
What are the main ways that Parliament can hold the Government to account effectively? **Types of Scrutiny*
- Select committees
- PMQs
- Legislative Scrutiny
Select committees
- Select committees look into issues in depth
- Questioning is calm, measured and less partisan than PMQs
- Select committees in the HoC investigate and report on the activities of Government departments
- Select committees in the HoL carry out topic based inquiries
Wright Reforms *Select committees
This reform meant that Party Whips can no longer influence the appointment of select committee members or chairs
Are select committees effective at scrutinising the Government? **Argue that they are*
- Since Wright reforms, select committees are more independent of the Government + Members and chairs are no longer chosen by Party Whips - This means that prominent backbench MPs who oppose the Government can obtain key roles in these committees
- Ex: Conservative Backbencher and former Immigration Minister Caroline Nokes is the chair of the Women and Equalities Committee and has consistently criticised the Government
- Calm and proffesional manner makes them more respected
- They are televised, which increases their influence
- Ex: In March 2023, the Privileges Select Committee scrutinised former PM, Boris Johnson over his involvement in the ‘partygate’ scandal, which further generarted public interest and media attention
Are select committees effective at scrutinising the Government? **Argue that they are not*
- Resources for select committees have increased, but they are still scarce
- This means that they can only investigate a limited amount of topics in-depth - This limits their ability to hold the Government to account across multiple areas of policy
- One crucial way select committees scrutinise is by asking questions to witnesses
- Their power to call these witnesses is considerable but not unlimited - Meaning that it can sometimes be hard to perform effective scrutiny
- Ex: In 2013, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, blocked the Home Affairs Select Committee from interviewing Andrew Parker, (the Head of MI5)
Who was the Head of MI5 in 2013?
Andrew Parker
Political demagoguery
When a Politican makes false claims and promises in order to get power
Are PMQs effective at scrutinising the Government? **Argue that they are*
- PMQs is televised, which gives the Opposition and other parties the opportunity to expose Government failure and suggest why they would be more effective - Forces, Government toadress concerns of the public
- Ex: Corbyn took this further, by actually making a habit of asking questions from members of the public
- Misleading the HoC can lead to huge pressure to resign, which forces the PM and other MPs to be competent and to use rational arguments as opposed to political demagoguery, as it would embarass them and harm their party image
Political demagoguery refers to a Politican making false claims and promises in order to gain power - This can hurt the party image, because when these promises are not met, it can make the electorate feel less confident in that party’s vision/ideologies - Causing them to vote elsewhere
PMQs
- Televised at 12:00pm every Wednesday
- Opportunity for Opposition to ask 6 questions
- 2nd largest party can ask 2 questions
Are PMQs effective at scrutinising the Government? **Argue that they are not*
- PMQs is more focused on partisan political point scoring than effective scrutiny
- The PM and MPs can often treat it like it is Political theatre because it is televised - They therefore give answers designed to generate media attention and increase awareness of their party, than to answer honestly to effective scrutiny
- PMQs is also very boisterous - This creates a negative view of Politicans in the eyes of the public, which can decrease their trust in the Political process
Some people say PMQs should be scrapped. What could they put more emphasis on/replace it with?
- More emphasis on Liason Committee, which only usually takes place 3 times per year
- This committee provides more in-depth questioning to the PM
Some people say that PMQs should be scrapped and that more emphasis should be put on Liason committee meetings. What is a disadvantage of that?
- Former PM Boris Johnson, cancelled appointments twice to attend the Liason Committee and therefore avoided being scrutinised
- This means that maybe a new form of scrutiny needs to be introduced, rather than putting more emphasis on the Liason committee - As the PM can simply just cancel an appointment and therefore avoid being effectively scrutinised
Overall, are PMQs effective at scrutinising the Government?
- To a certain extent, PMQs can be effective
- This is because it allows the Opposition to publically expose Government failure, which forces the PM and MPs to be competent and up to date on policy
- However, it has become more about partisan political point scoring than effective scrutiny
- The effectiveness of scrutiny is also partially dependent on the work of the Leader of the Opposition
- Ex: Starmer is decent at this, which could be due to his previous work as a prosecutor - However, other Opposition leaders like Corbyn have been less effective at this aspect of being the Opposition Leader
