The House of Commons To be a watchdog in the House of Commons means that MP’s are vigilant and they scrutinise the executive effectively, However to be a lapdog in the House of Commons means the MP’s are loyal and obedient to their party and its leaders in the hope of promotion prospects. The House Of Commons is made up of 646 MPs who are elected to represent individual constituencies. The effect of this is that MP’s tend to be elected and re-elected by serving the interest of the majority within each constituency, however this tends to ignore the fact that all constituencies contain minorities of some kind i.e. racial, religion, class etc. who’s interests tend to be ignored. The house of commons is responsible for scrutinising the activities of the British government, this is to examine weather the government has exceed its authority or abuse its power, this demonstrate the fact that the house of common can be described as a watchdog carrying out scrutiny on the government. However the problem is that Britain’s unwritten constitution means that the limits of the government’s power is not explicit, but as a matter of interpretation. Which always turns out to be in favour of the government e.g. the fact that all members of the British government are drawn from the legislature means that there is conflict of interest between parl and govt. There is widespread ‘careerism’ among MP’s whereby they quickly realises that if they want to make a difference then they need to have a degree of political power. However this can only achieved as a member of the gove... ... middle of paper ... ...sector in the public services e.g. water taxes and also the war in Iraq. However the house of commons can be describe as being a watchdog, due (PMB's) are introduced and promoted by backbench MP's. They take up approximately 10% of Parliamentary time, and are held on twelve Fridays in each session. The majority of PMB's fail, due to the lack of time available. In reality, the MP needs the government support to pass a Bill. PMS's are prone to filibustering, although there have examples of success in the 1960's reforms to law on abortion and homosexuality. In 1994, a PMB influenced the government to lower the age of consent for homosexuals to 18, this prove that not all the mp’s can be described as being loyalty and obedient to some stand up for what they believe in and the house of common can then be called a watchdog.
Monitoring and sanctions are the more costly of oversight functions and the least likely to be used; they also do not ensure that the noncompliance problem will end. (McCubbins, Noll and Weingast 1987) This follows with McCubbins and Schwartz who theorize that members of congress do not neglect monitoring and their oversight functions but that they prefer the fire-alarm policing in which citizens tend to alert them to problems because it allows them to also do their legislative work (1984). Monitoring along with its economic costs also has political costs if an action that an agency takes in its noncompliance creates a new political interest then by sanctioning them members can incur political costs that would not have otherwise been present with proper anticipation and prevention. (McCubbins, Noll and Weingast 1987) Anticipatory prevention of noncompliance is a form of latent control that congress can exercise that is more effective; Calvert, McCubbins and Weingast develop a theory that includes this finding, “Latent oversight is, by definition, never observed; but its role in implementing political control over the agency is in principle just as important as that of active control (Calvert, McCubbins and Weingast, 1989).” This often occurs when the agent fears sanction in the case of this theory developed the veto, this point would
of the Senate while others such as the Reform Party want to elect it. Since the
The Two Party System of UK It has often been said that the United Kingdom possesses a two party political system. However, any balanced argument on this issue must take into account both the differing perspectives from which this subject can be viewed and the time period which is being evaluated. The two party theory is not universally accepted and many people argue that the UK can best be described as a multi party, dominant party or even a two and a half or three party system, depending on how the subject is approached. The most commonly held view is that Britain is a two party system.
The Constitutional Significance of the Decision of the House of Lords ‘This is the most important case to come before the House since I have been a member. ’[1] Constitutional lawyers have called the judges’ verdict on the terror laws one of the most important decisions from Britain’s highest court in 50 years. The 240-paragraph judgment, handed down on 16 December 2004 outlines the opinions of an unprecedented panel of nine law lords, instead of the usual five, because of its constitutional significance. The ratio of the case alone was of extreme importance, concerning the issue over the disproportionate and discriminatory locking up of foreign suspected terrorists without trial. It confirms how the House of Lord’s ensures the rule of law prevails when fundamental rights are questioned.
The most significant and challenge to the traditional view of parliamentary sovereignty was Britain’s membership of the European Community in 1972. The European Communities Act 1972 brought with it the requirement that European Law be given priority over domestic courts over conflicting issues of national law. This notion was a direct affront to parliamentary sovereignty, which required that if a later statute, contradicted and earlier statute, which sought to incorporate European Law into English Law, then the later statute should impliedly repeal the earlier statute. Therefore the European Communities act imposed a substantive limit on the legislative ability of subsequent Parliaments.
Parliamentary sovereignty, a core principle of the UK's constitution, essentially states that the Parliament is the ultimate legal authority, which possesses the power to create, modify or end any law. The judiciary cannot question its legislative competence, and a Parliament is not bound by former legislative provisions of earlier Parliaments. The ‘rule of law’ on the other hand, is a constitutional doctrine which primarily governs the operation of the legal system and the manner in which the powers of the state are exercised. However, since the Parliament is capable of making any law whatsoever, the concept of the rule of law poses a contradiction to the principle of parliamentary supremacy, entailing that Parliament is not bound by the Rule of Law, and it can exercise power arbitrarily.
Involved citizens try to make the world a better place for everyone and to bring people to the realization of why the issues that they face are at fault and how they should be restored.
Exploring To Which Extent the Parliament is Supreme There are two sides to this argument, one obviously defending that Parliament is Supreme in the law making process, and has utmost authority, the other stating the constraints on Parliament and there it is not supreme. Within Britain, parliament is the supreme law making body. The idea behind this is that the people select parliament and, therefore, the people make the law. We describe this as PARLIAMENTARY SOVEREIGNITY, That is to say that Parliament is the highest power in the land, and shall not be challenged. An example that shows parliamentary supremacy is Cheney .vs.
We , the Algos would like to enforce a Unitary Parliamentary Sovereignty, that is unicameral and enforces a flexible constitution. Seeing as we are a minority, we have been pressured to adopt the cultures of those who surround us. As minorities, we refuse to be overlooked and erased from society. We are proud of our culture and do not wish to live in similar conditions of the last dictator.
In fact, the only hard power the Lords may exercise is the delaying of bills, and even this delay is temporary. Should the government or Commons find the Lords thoughts wholly inapplicable or unacceptable, they may ignore them completely. The fact that they rarely ignore the suggestions of the Lords on any bill is a strong indicator that all parties involved find this to a workable, and perhaps even beneficial,
In 1787 the leaders of the states came together to establish a constitutional set of guidelines (laws), to ensure a more structured uniformed way of protecting the American people against total governmental control, and protecting the citizens rights. The constitution ensured that the branches would be serperated to detour from total control of one branch of government, Each branch of government has its own duties and responsibilities other than working along side the other branches. Below identifies the three branches of government as well as their responsibilities and process of being elected as a member.
to oppose the bill and to find any flaws in it. The role of parliament
If a member of the public that is a victim of fraud is ignored by the police, under a collateral attack, then is it a privilege of the Member of Parliament to ignore the criminal aspects of fraud by government agencies. Often enough a member of the community is selected because that person is someone that can bring in votes from others within that community, or someone that can be molded such that moral issues concerning the society can be set aside, or the ethical issues of a professional body can be
Grant, W. (2004) „Pressure Politics: The Changing World of Pressure Groups‟, Parliamentary Affairs, 57(2): 408-419
Constituent policies – involves the structure that makeup the government. Constituent policies are concerned with the establishment of government structure, establishment of rules or procedures for the conduct of government, rules that distribute or divide power and jurisdiction within the present and future government policies might be made. A structural example of constituent policy is the creation of Department of Homeland Security. In 2002, President George Bush did not see the need of a department to manage terrorism, however, he changed his mind and called on Congress to create a Department of Homeland Security. A procedural example of constituent policy is the Federal Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 with outlined the procedures to be used by agencies to ensure openness and fairness in agency decision-making. Constituent policies also include matters that involve personnel practices and budgetary actions.