Do the Wright thing: reform parliament!
The newspaper comment pages and think tank websites have been alight for the past couple of weeks, with discussion on the Wright Committee and it’s recommendations for reform of Parliamentary procedure. Praises are being sung and accusations made and the consensus seems fairly clear, those in favour of the recommendations being made by Labour back bencher Tony Wright, are not happy with the Government’s course of action. Upon ascending to the comfort of no. 10, Gordon Brown proclaimed that he wished to see massive reform of Parliament, he reaffirmed this at the height of the expenses scandal, but now it would seem this appetite for change has fizzled out.
These reforms are exactly what the House of Commons need, for too long the executive has had free reign over the business of the House, the ability of backbench MP’s to hold the executive to account are vastly overrated. The Presidential manner in which Tony Blair’s Government operated only perpetuated this inefficient culture, and sadly despite the optimism of many commentators, Gordon Brown hasn’t been much different.
This subject raises fundamental questions about how our system of Government operates in practice and how we believe it operates in the ideal. Anyone who has ever studied Law or Politics will remember the arrow laden charts used to explain the virtues of our bicameral legislature, the limitations on the will of the Executive. The basic idea being that the Government is not the supreme force in British governance, the House of Commons is. While this simplified analysis is basically correct, when we study the practical implementations we soon realise that the ability of the Commons to effectively scrutinise the Executive is blatantly flawed.
The fact of the matter is that many pieces of contentious legislation that we have seen over the years have made it onto the Statute book without ever being fully debated, and without much chance of being stopped. Under the current arrangements, the Government of the day has complete control over the business of the House, and whilst the Commons does have some limited oversight over this process (they are allowed to ask some questions once a week) the final say always rests with the Government, so inconvenient legislation, like that proposed by backbenchers, can be smothered, whatever support it has.
It was in the latter part of the 19th Century, that Standing Order 14 was introduced, it was this rule that has allowed the dominance of the Executive to continue unchallenged today, almost 130 years later. Since then, the Executive arms of the government have been expanded by policy groups and consultants directly responsible to No. 10. This has reflected broader moves away from the representative arms of government, towards bureaucracies like Primary Care Trusts – ultimately responsible to Ministers, only nominally responsible to a supine parliament.
So what are the proposals for change? The Wright Committee has made several recommendations that could vastly alter this state of affairs. Firstly, election of Select Committee members by secret ballot, diverting the task of appointing people to these extremely important positions, away from the Party Whips transferring the power to the House of Commons as a whole.
The second, and in my opinion the most important, of these recommendations, is the abolishment of Standing Order 14, and the establishment of a Business Committee, comprised of backbench MP’s from all Parties, that would acquire the duty of scheduling debates and votes in the House. The benefits of this could be far-reaching, the Government would lose the ability to force important parts of its programme through the Commons without the scrutiny that any self-respecting democracy should demand.
These recommendations are nothing new, the Hansard Society, amongst others, have been calling for such changes for some time now. Gordon Brown at one point before the summer recess seemed determined to realise it, demanding that the Wright Committee speed up its work to ensure their recommendations would be available for a slot on the Parliamentary schedule before the General Election, which they kindly did. But unfortunately, the tune seems to have changed and this where the criticisms have originated.
The Government have decided to table the proposals as a set of non-amendable resolutions for a vote, ironically using the powers the reforms aim to remove to do so. The drawback here is that the proposals cannot be properly debated and just one objection from any member of the house could derail them, which there is certainly a possibility of. Not that these proposals aren’t welcomed, they are, just the manner in which they are being introduced may anger some MP’s, who may seek to vote against simply because of the process by which they are being presented to the house.
If the Government is serious on these reforms, and really want to “seize the moment to lift our politics to a higher standard”, (so said GB), then the course of action should be clear, if we are to avoid defeat and blatant hypocrisy. The resolutions should be tabled as fully amendable, for an open debate. Obviously this needs to be done quickly, the vote is currently scheduled for the 4th March, so we are faced with the prospect of these vital reforms being crushed by just one MP in just a matter of weeks.
This really is a no brainer, despite the obvious democratic benefits, the Parliamentary Labour Party should see this as a serious boost to their ability to oppose an incoming Cameron Government, no matter how weak such a Government may be. So now it is in the hands of Harriet Harman as leader of the house to stand up and do the right thing! I can’t for the life of me imagine why there has been such a reckless handling of what could turn out to be the legacy of the Brown administration, now all we can do is wait and see what happens.
I would absolutely support the election of Select Committees by secret ballot, though perhaps it might not have the necessary effect.
What I do question is how a Business Committee would work. Political parties are elected on the basis of a mandate, which people expect to see carried through. A Business Committee would surely, in having such broad ranging powers, be able to hamper that?
A more appropriate reform would be to continue with the ballots for Private Members’ Bills, and to establish some safeguard for their time, so that the government can’t bury them by guillotining the time allotted.
Though it may quickly become a tool for the Opposition to be a pain in the arse, one could also create two methods of allotting private members’ bills; both by drawing lots and by updating the EDM procedure, so that with a given number of signatures (perhaps with a cross-party quota), a motion would have to be debated.
The thing to work out there would be how to turn EDMs, usually quite simplistic, into legislation that could be read by the House – but this is for later. My basic point is that I don’t foresee a Business Committee doing anything but getting in the way, or else the majority party’s representatives being specially chosen because they won’t annoy the Whips.
Well essentially I see it as a body that would arrange the governments business, not decide what that business is. Of course they would have the dual role of scheduling private members bills too which is very important.
I think the intention is to allocate the number of seats on the committee broadly in line with each party’s number of seats in the house, so as to avoid opposition shutting down government mandates through the committee. I think the presence of backbenchers would be sufficient to avoid government taking total control as well, and at the end of the day it does introduce committee meetings to the business process which clearly is not currently the case.
Your proposals on EDM’s would be a good move, theyre vitually pointless at the moment, kind of like Labour Party conference resolutions I suppose! I had interesting debates with my old law professor about this once, increasing the use of private members bills too would be a good move.
Arranging the government’s business would presumably involve deciding how much time is allotted, for example. A current government tactic of obfuscation is to declare that time has passed for a particular law; the power to decide time allotment would pass this power to the Business Committee.
My point is that this reform, unless it establishes set rules to protect minority rights in the chamber, will continue to allow the majority to play bureaucratic tricks – much like the Speaker of the House can do in the US House of Representatives, as he’s essentially a one-man business committee.