Gov

Question 1

Parliament Acts Limiting the powers of the Lords

Answer 1

• The Parliament Acts are two pieces of law, passed in 1911 and 1949, that limit the role of the House of Lords in the legislative process.
• 1911 Parliament Act: This not only put into law the convention that the Lords could not interfere at all in tax and spending but also removed the Lords’ power to veto any bill, reducing it to a power only to delay it by up to two parliamentary sessions.
• Several decades later, the 1949 Parliament Act reduced the Lords’ power of delay to one year over most bills.
• Hunting Act 2004 : Parliament Act 1911 used to bypass the lords

Question 2

Lords have become increasingly assertive in governmental scrutiny in the recent years

Answer 2

• Blocked the Sexual Offences Act 2000 + the hunting Act 2004, forcing the govt to employ the Parliament Act.
• The Blair and Brown governments were defeated only 7 times in the Commons but more than 400 times in the Lords.
• The 2010-2015 coalition government suffered 99 defeats in the Lords, notably on judicial matters + welfare reform.
• In the 2013-14 Parliamentary Session, the lords considered 62 bills and made 1,686amendments, several of which were particularly significant

Question 3

Secure majority governments make it more difficult to effectively scrutinise and amend legislation in the HoC

Answer 3

• FPTP system makes it so that an MP can be elected on a minority of the vote locally, and their party win a majority of seats in parliament on a minority of the vote nationally. That majority in parliament means they can pass any law they like.
• 2019 Cons Majority: The larger a government’s majority, the more room for manoeuvre for the Prime Minister. A majority of more than 80 seats means that even if 35–40 Conservative MPs vote against their own party, the executive would still pass its legislation. The larger a government’s majority, the more room for manoeuvre for the Prime Minister.

Question 4

HoL and Legislative Commitees help influence and change legilation.

Answer 4

• Committees significantly influence lawmaking in the UK Parliament by providing detailed scrutiny of bills, offering opportunities for amendments, and potentially shaping the final text of legislation. They can also take evidence from experts and interest groups to inform their deliberations.
• 2017 Homelessness Reduction Bill passed via the Communities and Local Government Committee.
• HoL amended the EU Withdrawal Bill for a softer Brexit.

Question 5

Lack of impact that debates and amendments have had on governmental decisions.

Answer 5

• Debates on major events, such as the one on military action in Syria in August 2013, can occasionally lead to government defeats, but this can be partly attributed to poor management of MPs by government whips.
• The opposition parties are allocated 20 days in each session to choose the topic for debate, but the government can ordinarily rely on its Commons majority to carry an amendment to a hostile motion.
• It is also worth noting that the government determines how much time is allocated to its debates.

Question 6

Debates and PMQs help scrutinise the Government efficiently.

Answer 6

• If an MP believes that an issue needs a minister to address it at once, they can apply to the speaker to ask an urgent question. If the speaker decides that this will serve the public interest, the minister is required to explain to the House of Commons ‘what the government is doing on the issue raised’.
• PMQ: In January 2022, speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle granted Angela Rayner an urgent question to the prime minister on whether he had knowingly broken lockdown restrictions by attending Downing Street parties during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Question 7

Select Committees are an efficent way to scrutinise and hold ministers to account.

Answer 7

• There is a select committee scrutinising each government department including the Education select committee which scrutinises the Department for Education and the Defence select committee which scrutinises the Ministry of Defence.
• An example of select committee effectiveness is seen in the Health, Science, and Technology Select Committee’s inquiry into the COVID-19 response, where revelations by Dominic Cummings led to increased scrutiny and calls for a public inquiry.
• Select committees can appoint specialist advisors and produce reports prompting government responses, as demonstrated in the Windrush scandal inquiry

Question 8

The House of Commons has the power to dismiss governments/start rebellions.

Answer 8

• 2019 Rebellion against Theresa May: MPs voted by 432 votes to 202 to reject the deal, which sets out the terms of Britain’s exit from the EU on 29 March.
• This caused Theresa May to resign in 2019.

Question 9

Secondary Legislation can be influenced by both the chambers against the Gov.

Question 10

Lords have no control over Money Bills unlike the commons.

Answer 10

• The Parliament Acts can also be used to pass money bills without the approval of the Lords. Money bills are pieces of legislation that relate to government expenditure and taxation – for example, the Supply and Appropriation Bills that authorise government spending on its policies. To be classified as a money bill, a piece of legislation has to be formally certified as such by the Commons Speaker.
• If a bill that the Commons Speaker has certified as a money bill passes the Commons but is not then passed by the Lords within a month of it being received, it can be sent for Royal Assent without the Lords’ approval. Money bills also cannot be amended by the House of Lords, and they have no power of delay (unlike with other bills as described above).

Question 11

The Lords is representative through the peerage of experts in their respective fields.

Answer 11

• The House of Lords contains peers who represent people in society that are less well represented in public life.
  The House of Lords represents expertise from across society and a range of different professional backgrounds.
  The House of Lords also represents different political views.
• The Conservatives have the most peers, with 273, while Labour has 187 and the Liberal Democrats have 78.
  There are also 184 “crossbench” peers who are not aligned to any party.

Question 12

The HoL is extremely socially unrepresentative - not carrying out its representative function properly.

Answer 12

• “Pale, stale and male.”
• A 2019 report, external suggested that about 6% of members in the House of Lords came from a minority ethnic background.
  This compared with 13% of the UK population, based on the 2011 census, external.
• Ninety-eight percent of the remaining hereditary Lords were privately-educated, compared to 56% of appointed peers.
• Average age being 69.

Question 13

FPTP system ensures that the HoC carries out their representative function.

Question 14

Mps redress the grieviances of their constituents in Parliament.

Answer 14

• Seni’s Law - Passed by Parliament after the Mp Steve Reed demanded it due to the death of a constituent in a mental health institution.
• First Labour MP since 1996 to get a PMB passed while in opposition.

Question 15

Instances of Mps ignoring their constituents and going against the wishes of them is not uncommon.

Answer 15

• More than 120 MPs went against their constituencies in Wednesday night’s Article 50 vote, an analysis of constituency data by BuzzFeed News shows.
• By using the best available constituency-by-constituency data on last year’s EU referendum result, it can be demonstrated that 120 MPs backed the bill despite representing constituencies that overall voted for Remain, and nine MPs voted against the bill despite a majority of their constituents supporting Leave.