Is This a Bad Law?
This is, at least on first reading, a worrying article about the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.
The full bill is here. It's not actually that long and if anyone is concerned about this, I suggest they read it.
From the Times article, you can follow a link to a letter (written five days previously) by six Professors of the Law Faculty at Cambridge. It supports David Howarth's views. Heavyweight stuff! I don't know how long it will be publicly available to view, but here is a quote:
...If passed, the Government could rewrite almost any Act and, in some cases, enact new laws that at present only Parliament can make.
The Bill subjects this drastic power to limits, but these are few and weak. If enacted as it stands, we believe the Bill would make it possible for the Government, by delegated legislation, to do (inter alia) the following:
- create an new offence of incitement to religious hatred, punishable with two years' imprisonment;
- curtail or abolish jury trial;
- permit the Home Secretary to place citizens under house arrest;
- allow the Prime Minister to sack judges;
- rewrite the law on nationality and immigration;
- "reform" Magna Carta (or what remains of it).
However, having read the Bill, I'm not convinced the safeguards are 'few and weak'. They are described in Part I sections 13-16. There are three options: the minister chooses whether to follow the 'negative resolution procedure', the 'affirmative resolution procedure' or the 'super-affirmative resolution procedure'. As I understand it, the latter two require both houses of Parliament to approve the order for it to be enacted.
The seemingly controversial mechanism is the 'negative resolution procedure'. There the order is enacted after 40 days unless either house of Parliament resolves that the order should not be made. (Either house of Parliament can also - in the first 21 days - resolve that it has to follow one of the other two procedures instead.)
My interpretation is that the legislation does not bypass Parliament at all. The Executive cannot make any of the changes given as examples without Parliament's consent. If either house of Parliament feels that greater scrutiny or debate is required, it can vote down the order and force it through the normal legislative channels. So the secondary chamber has even greater blocking power than at present!
The only weakness I can see is if parliamentary procedures make it difficult for a minority group in either House to force the matter to a vote (or if the debate prior to the vote is unreasonably short). I don't know if that's the case or not. Subject to this uncertainty, it doesn't seem so unreasonable after all (bearing in mind the objective is to improve the efficiency of law-making).
I'd be very interested in your views on this Bill. If you comment, please state whether or not you have read it (if you don't say so, I will assume that you have not).
The full bill is here. It's not actually that long and if anyone is concerned about this, I suggest they read it.
From the Times article, you can follow a link to a letter (written five days previously) by six Professors of the Law Faculty at Cambridge. It supports David Howarth's views. Heavyweight stuff! I don't know how long it will be publicly available to view, but here is a quote:
...If passed, the Government could rewrite almost any Act and, in some cases, enact new laws that at present only Parliament can make.
The Bill subjects this drastic power to limits, but these are few and weak. If enacted as it stands, we believe the Bill would make it possible for the Government, by delegated legislation, to do (inter alia) the following:
- create an new offence of incitement to religious hatred, punishable with two years' imprisonment;
- curtail or abolish jury trial;
- permit the Home Secretary to place citizens under house arrest;
- allow the Prime Minister to sack judges;
- rewrite the law on nationality and immigration;
- "reform" Magna Carta (or what remains of it).
However, having read the Bill, I'm not convinced the safeguards are 'few and weak'. They are described in Part I sections 13-16. There are three options: the minister chooses whether to follow the 'negative resolution procedure', the 'affirmative resolution procedure' or the 'super-affirmative resolution procedure'. As I understand it, the latter two require both houses of Parliament to approve the order for it to be enacted.
The seemingly controversial mechanism is the 'negative resolution procedure'. There the order is enacted after 40 days unless either house of Parliament resolves that the order should not be made. (Either house of Parliament can also - in the first 21 days - resolve that it has to follow one of the other two procedures instead.)
My interpretation is that the legislation does not bypass Parliament at all. The Executive cannot make any of the changes given as examples without Parliament's consent. If either house of Parliament feels that greater scrutiny or debate is required, it can vote down the order and force it through the normal legislative channels. So the secondary chamber has even greater blocking power than at present!
The only weakness I can see is if parliamentary procedures make it difficult for a minority group in either House to force the matter to a vote (or if the debate prior to the vote is unreasonably short). I don't know if that's the case or not. Subject to this uncertainty, it doesn't seem so unreasonable after all (bearing in mind the objective is to improve the efficiency of law-making).
I'd be very interested in your views on this Bill. If you comment, please state whether or not you have read it (if you don't say so, I will assume that you have not).