The Different Types of Delegated Legislation
a). Describe the different types of delegated legislation, explaining
how the power to make them is delegated (15 marks)
Delegated legislation is made up of laws that are created under the
authority of Parliament, but not by Parliament itself. The Enabling
or Parent Act is what is used to specify the person or group with the
power to make more specific laws and the extent of their power. There
are three types of delegated legislation which are statutory
instruments, orders in council and bylaws.
Statutory instruments are made by Government ministers after
Parliament gives them the power to create them to use in assisting
government departments, for example, where time limits or fees are
set. This is shown in R v Secretary of State for the Home Department,
ex parte Simms (1999) where the Home Secretary made regulations to
control prisoners’ visits.
Orders in council are created by the Queen and the Privy Council,
which advises the Queen and the power to do so comes from an Enabling
Act from Parliament. Orders in council are used to transfer power to
other government ministers to those in Northern Ireland assemblies.
They are also used when Parliament is not sitting, as it is a lot
easier to organise a meeting with the Privy Council than it is to call
the whole of Parliament. Orders in Council are also used to enforce
Acts of Parliament.
Bylaws are created by public corporations and local authorities, like
County Councils and deal with matters involving their area and apply
only to that area. County Councils may create a bylaw to help improve
the appearance of their area...
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supervision from Parliament, for example, the Sierra Leone Order 1997,
which banned the selling of arms in Sierra Leone. It is argued that
these sorts of regulations are created with little public knowledge
and don’t receive a lot of criticism in the media or scrutiny by
Parliament. This has also been acknowledged in a report made by the
Commons Select Committee on Procedure in 2000. Legislation involving
affirmative procedure is subject to more debate than those involving
negative procedure, even if the negative procedure involves
controversial matters. It is also stated that time and expertise is
often wasted where more controversial issues are dealt with in a
matter of minutes, whereas major changes in the law can pass through
Parliament undebated, simply because they are in negative statutory
instruments.