Parliament

Question 1

What is the structure of Parliament?

Answer 1

Consists of the Commons, Lords and Monarch

Question 2

What is the Monarch’s role in Parliament?

Answer 2

Signing Bills to become Acts
Makes speeches once a year to announce session’s legislation (written by gov’t)

Question 3

Is Parliament bicameral or unicameral?

Answer 3

Bicameral
Commons and Lords

Question 4

What is the structure of the Commons?

Answer 4

650 MPs are elected, 1 for each constituency
Independant MPs exist but are rare
MPs are divided into members of the governing party (right of the speaker) and opposition parties
MPs are also divided into frontbench and backbench
Party whips for each party keep order

Question 5

How do MPs elect a Speaker?

Answer 5

After elections, MPs elect a speaker
- continues to represent constituency but stops acting in a ‘party political’ way
- Currently Sir Lindsay Hoyle (formerly Labour)

Question 6

2024 Election: what are the number of MPs per party in the Commons?

Answer 6

412 Lab
121 Con
72 Lib Dem
9 SNP
29 Other

Question 7

How does someone become an MP?

Answer 7

They join a party, get selected as prospective parliamentary candidate for constituency by party local activists, beat rival PPC’s in election (ensure not to annoy local party activists with campaign so much they deselect you)

Question 8

What is the structure of the Lords?

Answer 8

2024: 805 members

Question 9

What is the history of the Lords?

Answer 9

1911- lowered delaying period to 2 years
1949- lowered delaying period to 1 years
1958- Life Peerages Act, introduced appointment of life peers
1999- Blair removed all but 91 hereditary peers
2024- Starmer removed all remaining hereditary peers

Question 10

Who are the Lords Spiritual?

Answer 10

26 top CofE Bishops including the Archbishop of Canterbury

Question 11

What is the status of other religious leaders (not Anglican) in the Lords?

Answer 11

Leaders of other faiths (ie Muslim, Hindu, Jewish) can become life peers but have no official status

Question 12

What are the 2 ways life peers can be appointed?

Answer 12

• PM has certain allocations for members of the party if they no longer have their seat
  ie Boris Johnson recommended former loyalist Minister Nadine Dorries, overruled by appointment commission 2023 as she didn’t resign her Commons seat in time
• Lords Appointment Commission appoints non party political peers ie Scientists to maintain number of crossbenchers

Question 13

What is an example of any PM can fill the Lords with people with little merit, also often party donors.

Answer 13

PM has certain allocations to recommend peerages for members of the party if they no longer have their seat

Question 14

How is party balance in the Lords

Answer 14

There is no firm rules on party balance
- example of uncodified constitution

But convention since 1999 that parties nominate to reflect the Commons’ strength (ie Labour elected 2024, so they nominated more Lab peers)
Large number of crossbenchers ensure governing party won’t have overall majority

Question 15

How often are Lords Speakers elected?

Answer 15

Every 5 years
Currently Lord John McFall

Question 16

What happened in 1265?

Answer 16

Monarch calls first parliament because needs consent for tax
- Aristocrats sit in Lords chamber
- Richest commoners in each county sit in the Commons

Question 17

What happened between 1642-9?

Answer 17

Civil War
- Parliamentarians unhappy that Charles I sent soldiers to arrest some commoners

Question 18

What happened in 1689?

Answer 18

Bill of Rights
- establishes parliamentary sovereignty from Monarchs
- Commons and Lords roughly equal power to legislate
- Ministers and PMs often from Lords

Question 19

What happened during the 19th Century Industrial Revolution?

Answer 19

Increased demands for the vote to be extended (for Commons), gradually making Commons more powerful/legitimate compared to Lords
- Last PM from Lords is Salisbury in 1901

Question 20

What happened in 1911?

Answer 20

Parliamentary Act
- Liberal gov’t reduces Lords power over money bills
- Reduces veto to delaying power of 2 years

Question 21

What happened in 1949 Parliamentary Act?

Answer 21

Labour gov’t reduces delaying power to 1 year

Question 22

What happens in 2005 Constitutional Reform Act?

Answer 22

Top judges known as ‘law lords’ moved out of Lords into independent Supreme Court

Question 23

What are the 3 functions of Parliament?

Answer 23

Represent
Legislate
Scrutinise

Question 24

Why is Representation important?

Answer 24

Essential parliament represents voters effectively

Question 25

What are the 3 forms of representation?

Answer 25

Constituency Representation (Commons)
Group Representation
Social Representation

Question 26

What is Constituency Representation?

Answer 26

Job of MP to represent interests of all constituents regardless of whether they voted for them
- Lords cannot represent this way because it is unelected

Question 27

What is Group Representation in the Commons?

Answer 27

MPs will often represent interests relating to a previous job (ie trade unionist)
- Pressure groups conduct letter writing campaigns to persuade MPs
- MPs form ‘all party’ parliamentary groups ie on Islamaphobia

Question 28

How does FPTP negatively effect group representation in the Commons?

Answer 28

Parties form as a group, but FPTP means MPs don’t rep as accurately as they should
- Ie 2019 election Cons won 43.6% of vote by 56.1% seats

Question 29

What is Group Representation in the Lords?

Answer 29

Lords have more time to represent groups because they don’t have constituency work
- rep groups more effectively because so many are independent-> Party line/whipping is weaker

Question 30

How is group representation ineffective in the Lords?

Answer 30

Party representation is patchy
- takes time for governing party to reflect numbers of the Commons in the Lords
- ie 5 UKIP MPs in Lords before 2019 (only 1 UKIP MP), but not enough SNP peers

Question 31

What is Social Representation and what are the issues of trying to match the social make up of the country?

Answer 31

Some argue Parl should represent social make up of country. (Problem in measuring social class Parl only collects stats of whether privately educated.)

Question 32

What are the Commons representation stats in 2019?

Answer 32

Women 34% (3% 1979!)
Av age 50
Ethnic minority 10% (15% in pop)
LGBTQ+ 7%
Privately educated Cons 44% Lab 19% (7% pop)

Question 33

What are the Lords representation stats from 2019?

Answer 33

Women 28%
Av age 71 (big fuss about appointee Boris Johnson, called Charlotte Owen aged 30)
Ethnic minority 6%
Privately educated 60%

Question 34

What is the main function of Parliament?

Answer 34

Legislative function

Question 35

Why is the Legislative function the main function of parliament?

Answer 35

Democracies must be based on popular consent. Because there is no direct democracy voters indicate support for manifesto which parliament must then put into law. One of the most important laws is the annual budget authorising the gov’t to tax and spend (Monarch not doing this caused civil war).

Question 36

What are the 3 types of legislative processes?

Answer 36

1.Private: by external orgs eg a church (not important)
2.Private Members’ Bills by individual MPs; important but rare unless gov’t provides time to support, which they may do if it’s a controversial conscience issue they do not want to get involved with, eg 1967 David Steel’s Abortion Act. 2017-19 15 PMBs passed: egs Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Act 2019 and one on process EU Withdrawal to prevent No Deal Brexit (Yvette Cooper)
3.Public Bills intro by gov’t (vast majority of bills).

Question 37

What are the stages to pass a bill?

Answer 37

White Paper and/or draft Bill
Formal process usually starts in Commons with First reading (title), Second reading (big debate) Committee stage (line by line scrutiny and amendment), Report stage (back on floor of Commons), Third reading final debate.
Repeat process in Lords.
If Lords amends Commons has to consider, could lead to ‘ping pong’.
When both houses agree Monarch signs (‘royal assent’ – not refused since 1708), Bill becomes Act.

=