U2T2 House of Commons Committees Flashcards
Name the three committees in the House of Commons:
-The Public Accounts Committee
-(the 19) Departmental Select Committees
-The Liaison Committee
-The Backbench Business Committee
Features of the Public accounts committee
-The public accounts committee scrutinises the value for money of public spending.
-the chair is always a member of the opposition.
-members act independently of their parties in here
-each member is elected by MPs
Features of the Departmental select committees
-there are 19 in total of which investigate the work of each individual governmental department they each have a membership usually up to 11.
-they scrutinise work of each department through it’s efficiency, effectiveness and fairness.
-the membership is elected in proportion to party seats in the HoC. And therefore scrutiny levels are lowered in large majority governments.
-the chairs may be from any party.
-they can call witnesses of civil servants, pressure group representatives etc to provide evidence or recommendations
Features of the Liaison Committee:
-made up of the chairs of each of the departmental select committees.
-they recommend topics to be debated during backbench day in the main chamber.
- since Tony Blair in 2002, around three times yearly, the prime minister appears before the committee and takes on topical questions.
-This is said to be much more effective than the confrontational prime ministers questions.
-they are in charge of calling elections for the membership of each committee
-they allocate the budget of each committee.
Features of the Backbench Business Committee
-The Backbench Business Committee was established in 2010 under one of the Wright Reforms
-It has eight elected members, reflecting the party balance in Parliament.
-The committee schedules around 35 debate days per session.
-It focuses on issues raised by backbenchers, not government or opposition leadership.
-Topics for debate are chosen based on MPs’ proposals and public interest and is non-partisan.
-The committee operates independently from government control.
-It has enabled debates on significant issues like NHS funding and public petitions.
-It works with the Petitions Committee to address topics raised by e-petitions when they get 10000 signatures
What is a role of the Public accounts committee?
- scrutinises value for money
- scrutinises the governments handling of the economy
- scrutinises the efficiency and effectiveness of public spending
- in general, it holds the government and civil servants to account for the delivery of public services.
- the committee also conducts investigations into public finances (taxes, and on how well the money is allocated to what)
Examples of investigations led by the PAC
2016- google payed a back tax of ten years only £130 million which His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs deemed far too low. This concluded with a 2017 finance bill to give the HMRC higher powers to deal with tax avoidance.
2019- scrutinised the Home Office’s attempts to shift policing focus onto organised crime because their initiatives weren’t effective enough. This ended with the Home Secretary of 2020, Preti Patel announcing £750 million towards police recruitment.
Examples of departmental select committees’ reports:
2016- business, innovation and skills- investigation into workers being payed below minimum wage. This concluded with compensation for the amount of time spent receiving minimum wage.
2018 - home affairs- with the wind rush scandal, the investigation criticised the changes made to deny real British citizens rights that they deserved. This concluded with an apology and acknowledgement of the lack of knowledge and openness of the issue. The committee also recommended immediate reforms of procedure to prevent it happening again.
2020- Transport- led an investigation into how the aviation industry was treating their employees. This was one of the main factors that made sure the 14 day quarantine ended by June 2020.
