parliament. Flashcards
The origins and development of the UK
Parliament
The origins of the British Parliament can be traced far back into medieval history.
King Henry III (1216–72) did not want to share power, provoking conflict with the
nobility led by Simon de Montfort. Eventually, Henry was captured at the battles of Lewes in 1264 and Simon de Montfort summoned representatives of the nobility and senior churchmen, together with two knights from each county and two
burgesses from leading towns, to meet at Westminster Hall in 1265. By broadening
the membership beyond the nobility, the de Montfort Parliament is often considered
the first English Parliament.
Key events in the development of the UK Parliament
- The de Montfort Parliament 1265 The decision of the nobleman Simon de
Montfort to summon commoners as well
as nobles and churchmen to Westminster
Hall in 1265 to discuss reforms is generally
seen as the first recognisable parliament. - Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949 The 1911 Act established the principle that the House
of Lords, as an unelected body, could only delay, not veto, legislation that the House of
Commons had passed. In 1949 the Lords’ delaying power was reduced to 1 year. - Extension of the franchise — 1832, 1867, 1884, 1918, 1928 and 1969 These parliamentary reform acts gradually extended the franchise until in 1928 the principle of universal franchise was established when the vote was given to
everyone over the age of 21. In 1969 the voting age was reduced to 18 - House of Lords Act 1999 All but 92 hereditary peers were removed from the House of Lords. As a result, most members of the Lords are life peers, which has made
the House of Lords more assertive in its dealings with the House of Commons.
During the seventeenth century both Houses of Parliament increasingly asserted
their authority against the Crown and in 1689, following the Glorious Revolution,
William III accepted the Bill of Rights, which established the principle of parliamentary supremacy. As the franchise was extended during the nineteenth century, the legitimacy of the elected House of Commons grew at the expense of the unelected House of Lords. The supremacy of the Commons over the Lords was not achieved until the early twentieth century, however, when the attempt by the House of Lords to veto the ‘People’s Budget’ led to the Parliament Act 1911. This abolished the Lords’ right of veto over legislation that had passed the Commons. In future the Lords would only be able to delay legislation for 2 years. In 1949, another Parliament Act reduced this to just 1 year.
Although British democracy has evolved over many centuries, this has occurred
without the codification of the British constitution and so there is no authority
greater than that of the British Parliament. Parliament is the nation’s supreme law-
making body and the judiciary cannot strike down an Act of Parliament because of
the principle of parliamentary sovereignty.
The UK has a parliamentary, rather than a presidential, form of government. This
means that the voters elect the House of Commons and the executive is then selected from its membership together with some members appointed from the House of Lords. In this way, the executive and the legislature are fused and the executive cannot claim its own authority. Instead, its power derives from the support of the
House of Commons and if that support is withdrawn through the loss of a vote of
confidence, then the government must resign.
The composition of the House of Commons - Frontbench and backbench MPs
MPs can be divided into frontbench and backbench MPs. MPs who have been
invited by the prime minister to join the government as senior ministers, junior
ministers or permanent private secretaries are all bound by the principle of collective
ministerial responsibility. This means that they present, and must publicly support,
government policy from the front benches. The main opposition party has its own
shadow frontbench team, whose members scrutinise their government counterparts.
Like the government front bench, they are also required to support their party’s
leadership.
The composition of the House of Commons - Party whips
All the main political parties appoint whips to maintain party discipline. MPs are
elected on a party manifesto. However, they also represent the interests of their
constituencies and, as Edmund Burke explained in the eighteenth century, should
also act according to their ‘judgement’. The parliamentary leadership needs to
tightly control its MPs, otherwise their control of the party could break down.
The Whips’ Office is thus an essential part of the House of Commons.
Whips encourage and sometimes possibly even cajole their MPs to support the party line. They also report back any
potential large-scale rebellions that might encourage the party leadership to modify its position to avoid defeat. On especially important issues, a three-line whip is issued, which requires MPs to attend a vote (division) and to vote as demanded by the leadership. If MPs refuse, they may
have the party whip withdrawn from them, which means they lose their membership of the parliamentary party.
In September 2019, 21 Conservative MPs, including high- profile former ministers such as Kenneth Clarke, Philip Hammond and Rory Stewart, had the party whip withdrawn for supporting the House of Commons taking control of EU withdrawal negotiations.
Whips may also resort to more underhand approaches. Some, like the political commentator Philip Cowley, have claimed that Conservative whips used to keep a ‘black book’ containing details of the private lives of party representatives to use as leverage.
2 Whips have been accused of both bullying and blackmail. Jack Straw recalled being thrown against a wall by Labour whip Walter Harrison following his election in 1979.3
More recently, William Wragg accused whips of threatening to withdraw investments from the constituencies of fellow Conservative MPs seeking to oust Boris Johnson as party leader in January 2022.4
The composition of the House of Commons - The speaker of the House of Commons
There is one MP whose role it is to be impartial. This is the speaker of the House
of Commons, who does not engage in political debate. Their role is to ensure that
Parliament functions as effectively as possible. The speaker arranges parliamentary business with the leaders of the main political parties, ensures that proper procedure is followed and presides over debates in the House of Commons. The speaker also has a disciplinary function and if MPs are deliberately disobedient, abusive, or accuse another MP of lying, they can be suspended. In 2022, then leader of the Scottish National Party at Westminster, Ian Blackford, was suspended by the speaker for claiming that the prime minister, Boris Johnson, had been ‘wilfully misleading Parliament over lockdown parties held at Downing Street. Since the election of John Bercow in 2009, the speaker has been elected by a secret
ballot of all MPs. Once elected, they are then ceremonially dragged to the Speaker’s
Chair and at the beginning of each new Parliament must seek re-election, although
this is usually just a formality.
The composition of the House of Commons - The leader of the official opposition
The role of the leader of the official opposition is to ensure that the government is thoroughly scrutinised, while convincing the public that the official opposition is an
alternative government in waiting. The opposition since the 1970s has been able to
claim Short money from public funds to finance the leader of the opposition’s office
and help with parliamentary business. The leader of the opposition is also given the
right to ask six questions at Prime Minister’s Question Time. This enables the leader
of the opposition to put high-profile pressure on the prime minister by highlighting any failures of policy and offering their own political solutions. The leader of the opposition also selects a shadow cabinet, whose task it is to hold the government accountable and persuade the electorate that they could be trusted in government.
The main functions of the House
of Commons - legislation
The House of Commons must agree to enact a bill if it is to become law. If it decides
not to vote for legislation, then it will fail to pass. A bill is formally presented to
Parliament at its first reading. MPs then have their first opportunity to debate the
main principles of a bill at its second reading. Following its second reading, a bill
is scrutinised in detail by MPs on a Public Bill Committee. The bill is further
debated at its report stage and at its third reading, before being sent to the House of
Lords where the same process takes place. Once all the appropriate stages have been
successfully gone through, a bill receives royal assent and becomes law.
The various stages at which a bill is scrutinised before it becomes law should mean that the House of Commons legislative function works well. However, critics note
that:
l Public Bill Committees vote on party lines and always have a government
majority, which may impact on the objectivity when offering amendments to a
bill.
l On many bills, MPs are also expected to vote the way the whips tell them to,
limiting genuine engagement with the potential strengths and weaknesses of a bill.
l Many changes to the law are now made by secondary/delegated legislation using
statutory instruments (known sometimes as Henry VIII clauses) rather than by
enacting primary legislation. By using statutory instruments the executive can
thereby sidestep House of Commons’ scrutiny.
The main functions of the House
of Commons - providing ministers
n the British parliamentary system, the legislature and the executive are fused —
the legislature provides the executive. There is a convention that the major office
holders in government are members of the House of Commons because this chamber
possesses democratic legitimacy.
An advantage of the parliamentary system is that MPs can prove their abilities in the
legislature and so can persuade the executive of their fitness for government office.
When the young Conservative MP Iain Macleod impressed Winston Churchill in
parliamentary debate, Churchill demanded that he be in government. When the
chief whip told him, ‘He’s too young to be eligible’, Churchill responded, ‘He’s too
eligible to be too young.’
However, the way in which Parliament provides the front benches for the
government and opposition does significantly restrict choice. As many as one in
three members of the governing party may be given a ministerial role. Critics also
note that the prime minister selecting the government from their backbenchers
gives them significant patronage power. This is likely to encourage conformity
and reduce debate as backbenchers support the government in the expectation of political advancement.
scrutiny and debate - the backbench business committee.
The Backbench Business Committee was established in 2010 and provides backbench MPs with 35 days a year in which they can control parliamentary business. MPs can ask to raise any issue with the committee, which is an opportunity to generate debate on areas that might otherwise be neglected by government. In 2021–22, some of the debates the committee arranged included the Black History Month, gender-specific religious persecution and on St Patrick’s Day 2022, the role of the Irish in Britain.
scrutiny and debate - Emergency debates
Under House of Commons standing order 24, an MP may request an emergency
debate. If the speaker allows, an MP has three minutes to make the case in the
chamber for an emergency debate. If the speaker allows it, the House of Commons
can decide whether the emergency debate will take place. On 3 September 2019,
Oliver Letwin’s case for an emergency debate on the House of Commons blocking
a no deal Brexit was approved by the then speaker John Bercow. When it passed
(328–301) this enabled the Commons to successfully demand that the government
extend its Brexit negotiations by a margin of 329–300.
scrutiny and debate - Adjournment debates
Adjournment debates take place at the end of each day’s sitting. MPs can apply to
the speaker to ask a minister a question. When the MP has asked their question
and the minister has responded, other MPs may ask questions if the minister and
backbencher agree. Adjournment debates are limited to 30 minutes and are rarely
attended by many MPs, but they can raise issues of significant public interest. For
example, in 2020, Neil Parish MP’s adjournment debate called on the BBC to
protect regional news programmes.
Representation in parliment.
MPs should work hard to ensure that
the interests of their constituents are raised in the House of Commons. However,
the representative role of MPs has been criticised on the grounds that the House of
Commons is not sufficiently reflective of the social configuration of the UK today
since it is too influenced by privately educated, white middle-class males. Despite this, the membership of the House of Commons that was elected in 2019 was the most socially representative in parliamentary history, with the highest number of female MPs (34%), the highest proportion of BAME MPs (10%) and the highest number of LGBTQ+ MPs (7%).
Critics, however, note that 80% of these MPs have had a business or professional
career so the working class is significantly under-represented. 66% of MPs are
still male and 27% of MPs were privately educated when nationally this is just
6%.
However, it may be simplistic to argue that the background of an MP necessarily
informs their approach to politics. The leading private school, Westminster School,
has produced politicians as radically different as Tony Benn and Sir Nick Clegg,
and Clement Attlee (Labour prime minister, 1945–51) and Tony Blair (Labour prime
minister, 1997–2007) were both privately educated.
The parliaments that legalised
same-sex acts (1967) and legislated in favour of same-sex marriage (2013) were
primarily composed of straight men.
A more persuasive criticism is that the way of electing the House of Commons by
FPTP means that the political opinion of the electorate is not fairly represented.
Legitimation in parliament
Parliament was established to provide the consent that would legitimise the decisions
of the monarch. Although the Crown has now been replaced by a democratically
elected government, legitimation remains Parliament’s main constitutional function.
Thus, parliamentary bills require the consent of the House of Commons before they can be enacted.
Since the Parliament Act 1911, the House of Commons has the exclusive right to approve the Budget.
A convention has also developed whereby the House of Commons should be
consulted over committing British forces to military action.
Traditionally the prime minister has had the right to do this through the exercise of the royal prerogative. However, since the Iraq War in 2003, prime ministers have allowed Parliament to debate large-scale military commitments on the principle that the representatives of the nation should legitimise such important decisions in the life of the nation.
How well the House of Commons fulfils its legitimising role is controversial. This
is because the UK does not have a codified constitution determining exactly what
powers the House of Commons has in relation to the government. For example,
in 2018, Theresa May decided to join US-led assaults on the Syrian government
without consulting the House of Commons. This provoked an angry response from
the then Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who called it a ‘flagrant disregard’ of the
legitimising rights of Parliament.
However, attempts by Theresa May’s government to begin the process by which
the UK would enter negotiations to exit the European Union without consulting
the House of Commons failed. In the Gina Miller case (2017), the Supreme Court
declared the prime minister could not legally do this through the royal prerogative. Instead, ‘the UK’s constitutional arrangements require such changes to be clearly authorised by Parliament.
The composition of the House of Lords.
Although the House of Lords is referred to as ‘the Upper Chamber’, its
authority is considerably less than that of the House of Commons. As a primarily
appointed chamber it cannot claim the democratic legitimacy that the House of
Commons can.
Throughout most of its history the House of Lords was primarily composed of
peers, whose claim to membership was based on their possession of a hereditary
noble title, as well as a much smaller number of bishops representing the Church of England. These two groups comprised the ‘lords temporal’ and the ‘lords spiritual’.
However, the expansion of the franchise during the nineteenth century meant
that the influence of the House of Lords declined as the authority of the House of
Commons increased. The Parliament Act 1911 further diminished the power of
the House of Lords by removing its right to veto legislation passed by the House of
Commons.
In 1958, the Life Peerages Act gave the prime minister the authority to nominate
life peers to the House of Lords. Life peers do not pass on their title, and their
appointment to the Lords is based on their public service. This opening up of the
membership of the House of Lords to people who had distinguished themselves
in the service of their country gave the upper house a new sort of professional
legitimacy.
In 1999, the Labour government of Tony Blair removed the right of the 750 hereditary peers to continue sitting in the
upper chamber. However, to avoid a confrontation with the Lords, Blair agreed to a compromise, whereby 92 hereditary
peers could be elected to the Lords by the hereditary peerage. The number remains fixed at 92 and is continually refreshed
by the hereditary peers choosing new peers from among the peerage. The party allegiance must also remain as it was in 1997 so there will always be 42 Conservatives, 28 Crossbenchers, 3
Liberal Democrats, 2 Labour and 17 non-affiliated hereditary peers. As a result of these reforms the House of Lords is now
composed of a mixture of life peers, elected hereditary peers and bishops of the Church of England. Life peers are by far the most numerous and are nominated to the Crown by the prime minister, on the advice of Downing Street’s Main Honours Committee and the opposition parties. The politically neutral House of Lords Appointments Commission (HOLAC) also appoints several crossbenchers and scrutinises political appointments, although it has no right of veto.
In 2022, there were almost 800 members of the House of Lords. Of these, 26
were bishops of the Church of England (including the Archbishops of Canterbury
and York), 92 were hereditary peers and the remainder were life peers. Given that
life peers should be appointed because of their service to the nation, the House of
Lords is much less influenced by party politics than the House of Commons. Life
peers can choose to take the whip of a political party, but a significant number sit as
crossbenchers (Table 6.2).
Table 6.2 The composition of
the House of Lords, 2022
conservative - 257
labour - 168
crossbench - 184
lib dem - 84
bishops of the church of negland - 26
A government that has been in office for a long period of time can appoint a
considerable number of life peers to the House of Lords. There is also a convention
that the government should make nominations to the Lords roughly based on
the political configuration of the House of Commons. During his 10 years as
prime minister (1997–2007), Tony Blair recommended 374 appointments to the
House of Lords. Since he won such commanding majorities in the House of
Commons (1997, 2001), the majority of these were Labour (162) or crossbench
(96) appointments.
As in the House of Commons, the government and the opposition have their own
frontbenchers in the House of Lords. The Lords is presided over by the lord speaker,
who, in the same way as the speaker of the House of Commons, manages the
chamber and advises on procedure. In 2021, Lord McFall of Alcluith was elected
lord speaker. Since the House of Lords primarily focuses its expertise on scrutinising and revising legislation, its debates are considerably more courteous than those in the House of Commons.
Buying influence?
The way in which the prime minister can recommend peerages has long been controversial. The First World War music hall refrain:
‘Lloyd George knew my father
Father knew Lloyd George’
satirises the way in which David Lloyd George (1916–22) abused this right. More recent prime
ministers have been similarly criticised.
- When he unexpectedly resigned as prime minister in 1976, Harold Wilson was widely
mocked for his ‘lavender list’ of appointments to the House of Lords, which included his close friend, the businessman Joseph Kagan, whose company had invented the Gannex coat that Wilson liked to wear. - On his resignation in 2016, David Cameron was accused of similar political cronyism, appointing 13 Conservative peers, 2 crossbenchers and just 1 Labour peer to the House of Lords. Among the newly appointed peers were Cameron’s chief of staff, Ed Llewellyn, the head of his Policy Unit, Camilla Cavendish, and his head of operations at Downing Street, Liz Sugg.
- Boris Johnson was also criticised for the peerages he recommended. HOLAC refused
to endorse peerages for Peter Cruddas, a leading donor to the Conservative Party, and expressed security concerns over a life peerage for Evgeny Lebedev, the owner of the Evening Standard and a close friend of Johnson. On both occasions the prime minister ignored HOLAC’s advice.
The main functions of the House of Lords - legislation
Although legislation may be introduced into the House of Lords, especially if it is
non-controversial, most bills begin in the House of Commons and then proceed
to the Lords. As a non-elected chamber, the House of Lords is unable to stop bills
that have passed the House of Commons from becoming law. However, the Lords
plays an important role in the legislative process. When a bill leaves the House
of Commons it is sent to the House of Lords, where it is examined in detail in
the chamber of the House of Lords. Here any member of the House of Lords can
propose an amendment, and given the expertise of the Lords these amendments
are often highly important in refining the content of a bill. Therefore, the primary
purpose of the Lords is as a revising chamber.
The Commons does not have to accept the advice of the Lords and the Lords can
only delay legislation for a year. However, their advice is often very valuable and
the amendments that they make can often be accepted by the House of Commons
as improving the quality of a bill. Since members of the Lords can sit for life, and
a significant number of them are crossbenchers, they are also less influenced by the dictates of the whips and so can address the merits and demerits of legislation with a more open mind. The way in which the two chambers negotiate over
proposed amendments to legislation before it receives royal assent is often referred
to as ‘parliamentary ping-pong’. This can be a highly productive form of political
engagement.
However, because of the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the government can still
pass legislation over the objections of the House of Lords. In 2000, for example, the
Sexual Offences (Amendment) bill, which reduced the legal age for gay sex from 18
to 16, easily passed the House of Commons but was rejected by the House of Lords.
The government quickly invoked the 1949 Parliament Act to give the bill royal
assent, effectively bypassing the Lords.
Heavy defeats in the House of Lords may persuade the government to reconsider
whether to modify or even continue with legislation. This is especially the case
if legislation has passed the House of Commons with only a small majority and is
clearly controversial.
- In 2008, clauses in the Counter-Terrorism Bill to enable terror suspects to be held
for 42 days without charge were decisively defeated in the Lords by 191 votes.
Since these proposals had passed the Commons by only nine votes, Gordon
Brown decided to drop them from the bill. - In 2015, George Osborne’s plan to cut tax credits was defeated in the House of
Lords. In a significant show of bipartisanship, the Lords accused the government of introducing a significant financial measure through a statutory instrument to reduce parliamentary scrutiny. The resulting outcry was so great that Osborne dropped his proposals to reduce tax credits. - The House of Lords’ criticism that the Internal Market Bill (2020) did not
sufficiently recognise the authority of the devolved governments to determine
goods and services policy led to the government conceding that some regulatory differences could be accepted within a ‘common framework’.
However, if the government is fully committed to a policy and possesses a sizeable House of Commons majority, then it will be much less prepared to accept
Lords’ amendments.
l Following Boris Johnson’s 80-seat election victory in 2019, in January 2020 the House of Commons decisively rejected all five of the House of Lords’ amendments to the EU (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill. One of these was the Dubs amendment, which would have ensured that unaccompanied child
refugees would still be able to join relatives in the UK after Brexit.
l According to Baroness Hayter, these rejections of the Lords’ amendments demonstrated an arrogant and unwelcome disregard for the informed contributions which the House of Lords makes to political decision making: ‘Legislation is meant to be a dual responsibility. Let’s hope this is a one off and that normal service will shortly resume.’
The main functions of the House of Lords - scrutiny : House of Lords sessional committees and special enquiry
(ad hoc) committees
The House of Lords scrutinises the work of government in oral questions to ministers
and through committees. As a result of the expertise of its members, the committee
work of the House of Lords is especially highly regarded. Instead of monitoring
specific departments, committees concentrate on major social and political issues making recommendations to the government.
- Sessional committees deal with a particular issue and last from one parliamentary session to the next.
- Special enquiry (ad hoc) committees also investigate a specific issue but are set up
for a specific time period. - A particularly significant House of Lords sessional committee is the Secondary
Legislation Scrutiny Committee. The House of Commons has limited time to
examine secondary legislation, so the House of Lords Secondary Legislation
Scrutiny Committee plays a valuable role in highlighting when statutory instruments are so badly worded or poorly drawn up that they may not achieve their purpose. In 2022, a statutory instrument was used to reduce from 3 months to 4 weeks the time when claimants may limit their job search to the same occupation and pay level as their former occupation. The committee was highly critical of what it regarded as rushed measures. - The sessional House of Lords committee on the environment and climate change
has held government accountable for not achieving its carbon reduction targets.
It also launched an inquiry into how the public can contribute to resolving the
challenge of climate change: ‘We know achieving our environmental goals will
require not just innovation and technology but something far more personal –
changing our behaviours’ (Baroness Parminter, chair of the Lords committee on
the environment and climate change). - In 2020, a House of Lords special enquiry into the negative economic and social
consequences of gambling reported its findings and advice based on extensive
consultation.
‘Governing from the shadows’
Secondary legislation provides the government with a useful way of avoiding parliamentary scrutiny. Although the House of Commons must vote on primary legislation, changes to the detail of existing Acts of Parliament can be delegated to government ministers and civil servants through statutory instruments (SIs, also known as Henry VIII clauses). Critics have accused governments of increasingly using statutory instruments to introduce
significant changes to the law without them being given the same scrutiny as a primary Act of Parliament. In 2020, for example, 1618 statutory instruments were passed and just 29 Acts of Parliament. This is why the veteran Labour MP Angela Eagle has accused recent Conservative governments of ‘governing from the shadows’. Although many statutory instruments are highly technical and so non-controversial, others
develop policy and so critics argue that they should have been enacted as primary legislation, thus enabling full parliamentary scrutiny. For example, statutory instruments were often used to develop the government’s strategy to the Covid-19 pandemic, including lockdown measures. The speaker of the House of Commons, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, made a statement in the
House which was highly critical of how the government was excessively deploying statutory instruments: ‘The way in which the government have exercised their powers to make secondary legislation during this crisis has been totally unsatisfactory.’
The main functions of the House of Lords - scrutiny : Joint House of Lords and House of Commons committees.
There are also a small number of joint committees of the House of Commons and
the House of Lords.
Three of them are permanent and meet regularly:
l Human Rights
l National Security Strategy
l Statutory Instruments
A strength of these committees is that they can consult widely and their membership
reflects the accumulated experience of both Houses of Parliament.
In 2022, for
example, members of the National Security Committee included: Tony Blair’s former
defence secretary, Lord Reid; the former cabinet secretary, Lord Butler; the former
chief of the general staff, Lord Dannatt; together with Tobias Ellwood, chair of the
House of Commons Defence Select Committee and Tom Tugendhat, chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Their questions, reports and recommendations
are therefore very highly regarded.
Other joint committees can be established to deal with a specific issue. These
include the Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill. As the government
prepared legislation to make ‘the UK the safest place in the world to be online’,
a joint committee was established to provide wide-ranging and detailed analysis
of the issues involved. According to its chair, Damian
Collins MP, the committee’s purpose was to ‘stress test
its most critical clauses’ and in its report in December
2021 it made 127 recommendations for enhanced
online security for the public.
’ Unfortunately for the government, Julian Lewis is not alone in thinking that it was ‘improper’ for party whips to try to control the outcome of the election for chair of the ISC – the joint Commons and Lords committee that scrutinises the work of the intelligence agencies. Current and ex-Conservative MPs have criticised the government’s attempt to install former minister Chris Grayling in the prestigious role. The incident is unlikely to have smoothed already-fractious relations between the government and its backbenches.
Unfortunately for Lewis, a former member of the ISC and former chair of the Defence Committee, he is now also a former Conservative MP, having had the whip removed for having had the temerity to nominate and vote for himself, and be supported by the four opposition members of the nine-member committee. Never mind that the legislation underpinning the ISC – the Justice and Security Act 2013 – specifies that the committee elects its own chair from among its members.
The government’s claim that it was not trying to influence the outcome of the election is not credible. On the contrary, it appears that it was so keen to see Grayling in the chair it nominated just Conservative members who had vowed to support him to be members of the committee. It also abandoned the past convention that no party should have a majority on the committee, ditching a proposed crossbench peer in favour of a Tory.’ + secondary legislation.
Legitimation, representation,
providing government and debate.
The Lords does not have a representative role in a democratic sense, although the ancient tradition that the Lords represents the spiritual as well as the temporal
realm is acknowledged by the presence of the bishops of the Church of England. Since legislation can be enacted without its consent it also cannot also claim a
legitimising role
However, the Lords plays an important role in scrutinising legislation. Its committees
also provide the government with valuable information and advice and members of
the House of Lords can serve as government ministers. In addition, the wisdom and experience of the House of Lords means that the questions for government and their less politically toxic chamber debates can raise vital issues of public concern.
The comparative powers of the House of
Commons and the House of Lords - The powers of the House of Commons
The House of Commons has the sole right to defeat a bill. It also possesses the
exclusive right to dismiss the government if it loses a vote of confidence.
In 1979, for example, the Labour government of James Callaghan had managed to
survive for 3 years as a minority administration. However, on 28 March that year
the government lost a vote of confidence by 310–311 votes. Callaghan immediately
asked the Queen to dissolve Parliament, telling the House of Commons, ‘Mr
Speaker, now that the House of Commons has declared itself, we shall take our case
to the country.’
The comparative powers of the House of
Commons and the House of Lords - The powers of the House of Lords
As long ago as 1867 Walter Bagehot, in The English Constitution, contrasted the
‘efficient’ part of government, which was the House of Commons, with the merely
‘dignified’, which was the House of Lords.
However, the House of Lords also has advantages over the House of Commons.
Since members of the Lords do not have the same constituency duties as MPs, they
can devote more of their time to scrutiny. As they are not elected or bound by a
party’s manifesto, they are more able to act independently. The large number of
crossbenchers also makes it more difficult for a government to dominate the House
of Lords.
Three examples of specialist experience in the House of Lords
Lord Norton of Louth
Philip Norton was appointed Professor of
Politics at Hull University in 1986. A
brilliant expert on Parliament and the
constitution, Lord Norton still teaches
undergraduates, regularly speaks at
schools and contributes to Politics Review.
His constitutional insights greatly inform
political debate in the House of Lords. His
personal blog, ‘The Norton View’, provides
a constantly updated mine of vital
information on how Parliament works
Baroness Black of Strome
Lord Darroch of Kew
Sue Black was appointed to the
House of Lords in 2021. As an
anatomist and forensic anthropologist,
she has played a leading role in
many criminal trials and war crimes
investigations including Kosovo and
Sierra Leone. She is president of St
John’s College, Oxford. In 2020, she
published the hugely popular, Written
in Bone: Hidden Stories in What We
Leave Behind
Lord Darroch of Kew
Kim Darroch was a member of the
diplomatic service for 40 years, rising to
national security adviser (2012–15) and
British ambassador to the United States
(2016–19). In 2019, Darroch resigned
from this position when secret memos
sent to the prime minister critical of
the Trump administration went public.
On his return from Washington, he wrote
Collateral Damage: Britain, America and
Europe in the Age of Trump (2020)
Although prime ministerial
appointments to the House of
Lords have been accused of
cronyism, the vast majority
of appointments
are non-
controversial.
Table
6.3
profiles
three
distinguished members of the
House of Lords.
The House of Lords also offers
a unique opportunity for
former members of the House
of Commons to continue in
public service and use their
accumulated political experience
to inform political debate and
advise government.
- Kenneth Clarke was a
Conservative MP from 1970
to 2019. He served in cabinet under Margaret Thatcher, John Major and David
Cameron. A pro-European, he lost the Conservative whip in 2019 for seeking
to delay Brexit. Raised to the peerage in 2020, he brings to the House of Lords
a wealth of experience as well as considerable independent judgement. - A former Labour MP, Alf Dubs, entered the House of Lords as Baron Dubs in
1994. In 1939, as a Jewish child, he escaped Prague on a Kindertransport. He has
often spoken about the plight of child refugees and in February 2022, in the early
stages of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, tweeted, ‘We cannot publicly say we’re
doing everything to help Ukraine but then turn our backs on those fleeing.’
A summary of the functions and powers of the House of Commons and the House
of Lords is given in Table 6.4.
Table 6.4 A comparison of the relative functions and powers of the House of Commons and the
House of Lords
house of commons
- Represents the nation and is
accountable to it in a general election - Can dismiss the government in a vote of
confidence - Must agree to the Budget
- Legitimises important decisions such
as the dissolution of Parliament and, by
convention, the commitment of the UK to
major military operations - The executive requires the consent of
the House of Commons for legislation to
be enacted - Scrutinises legislation in parliamentary
debate and Public Bill Committees - House of Commons select committees
monitor the work of government
departments
house of lords
- Can delay legislation for one
parliamentary session but cannot veto
it. According to the Salisbury Convention, if
proposed legislation has been included
in the winning party’s electoral manifesto
the Lords will not oppose it - Since the Parliament Acts 1911 and
1949 do not extend to statutory
instruments, the Lords, theoretically,
maintains a veto over them - The Lords’ main work is as a revising
chamber: offering amendments to
legislation and scrutinising the work
of government through committees,
ministerial questions and parliamentary
debate - If the House of Commons voted to
extend the life of a parliament beyond
5 years, the House of Lords could
constitutionally reject this proposal. This
provides a way in which the Lords can
protect civil liberties in the UK
key term : sailsbury convention
Salisbury Convention
Since the Lords cannot
claim democratic
legitimacy, the Salisbury
Convention established
the principle in 1945 that
the Lords will not seek to
stop legislation that was
contained in the governing
party’s manifesto. To do
so would be to oppose the
democratically expressed
will of the public in a
general election. The
Lords can still propose
amendments, but these
should not be designed to
wreck the bill.
Debate
The House of Lords fulfils an important parliamentary role
yes
The expertise of peers means that the amendments
they make to legislation can significantly improve it.
for example, in 2020, the house of lords send back the united kingdom internal market bill with reccomdations for amendments to it, wich the house of commons agreed to. this shows how the expertise of the lords is held in greta value.
no
in 2019, in January 2020 the House of Commons
decisively rejected all five of the House of Lords’ amendments to the EU (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill. One of these was the Dubs amendment, which would have ensured that unaccompanied child refugees would still be able to join relatives in the UK after Brexit.
yes
altough lods do not have the ability to veto bills due toe parliment act 1911, they can still veto a bill for up to 1 year wich in some cases may lead to the extinction of the bill.
this was the case when parliment tried to introduce a rwana bill, in wich any immigrant illegally trying to seek refuge would be imddeiatly deported to rwanda. the lods were furoius at this disregard for human rights and delayed the bill up to the time where the nect general election was coming with up to 7 cases of defeat in the house of lords. the bill was never passed.
no
In 2000, for example, the
Sexual Offences (Amendment) bill, which reduced the legal age for gay sex from 18
to 16, easily passed the House of Commons but was rejected by the House of Lords.
The government quickly invoked the 1949 Parliament Act to give the bill royal
assent, effectively bypassing the Lords.
yes
If the government dominates the House of Commons
with a very large parliamentary majority (Blair, 1997
and 2001), then the House of Lords provides an
important source of independent opposition.
they were defeated in the house of lords many times. an exmaple of this would be the racial and religous hatred bill wich lost to a total of -149 votes. the aim of the bill was to restrict the grounds on wich incitement of racial or religous hatred could be applied.
howver, if the goverment in party has a huge majoirty in first place, bills are not likely to be rejected by parliment, tony blair is a key example of this. in his ten yera reign his goverment lost a total of 4 bills, in the span of one year after the general election in 2005. since the lords do not have the poeer to veto as laid out in the parliment act 1911, and only hav the right to delay for one year due to the further act of 1949. the house of lords could not do much if the goverment decided to overull amendments they propose and go further with thier bills. this is shown by the fact that tony blair introduced 26,849 new laws over his reign.
How Parliament interacts with the executive - The role and significance of backbenchers in both houses
Backbenchers in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords are protected by parliamentary privilege.
This principle dates back to the Bill of Rights in 1689, which states, ‘the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament’.
As a result, parliamentarians are free to raise any issue they wish in Westminster without fear of being prosecuted in the courts for libel or defamation of character.
The main roles of backbench MPs are to represent the interests of their constituents,
scrutinise the work of government, consider the merits of legislation, legitimise
certain government decisions such as committing British troops to military action,
and raise issues that they regard as significant.
- How much influence backbenchers wield depends on the size of the government’s
parliamentary majority. Tony Blair won landslide parliamentary majorities in the
1997 and 2001 general elections and could survive even very large rebellions by
his backbenchers. In 2003, for example, 84 Labour MPs voted against involvement
in the Iraq War, but Blair still won the parliamentary vote. However, Labour’s
majority dipped to 66 in the 2005 general election and Blair subsequently failed
to introduce 90-day detention for terrorist suspects when 49 Labour MPs voted
against the government. - If a government has a very small or non-existent parliamentary majority,
backbenchers will be at their most influential as the whips, on both sides, will
need to make concessions to secure their support. Having lost her parliamentary
majority in the 2017 general election, Theresa May had to ‘manage’ rather than
‘lead’ Brexit to create as much cross-party support for her strategy as possible.
Ultimately, she failed, and it was only when Boris Johnson won an 80-seat
House of Commons majority in December 2019 that he was able to enact the
EU withdrawal agree
