Making parliament more transparent.

The House of Commons Procedure Committee, chaired by Tory MP Charles Walker, has suggested several important changes to the way Parliament operates to try to make it more logical and accessible.

One idea is that there might be some form of vote allowing bills which command wide support to be brought forward, with some priority for debate (any MP can put down a Bill on any subject - the trick is to get priority for debating time, which is currently allocated by "ballot," which is parliament-speak for a lottery).

This would be a logical extension of the re-empowerment of the Commons which began in the backwash of the expenses scandal

They also suggest that the government would be required to produce a statement giving its view of any Bill set down for second reading, and that it should be possible to ask the House to move the third reading of a private member's bill to prime time, both of which would make the process a bit more sensible.

I would like to see all these ideas given more attention. It might also help the public to see and understand what is going on if MPs who were trying to kill a proposal did so more often by voting it down openly rather than "talking it out" by speaking for longer than was necessary on it, or indeed talking for a little bit longer than was necessary on the previous measure so there wasn't enough time left after the previous bill has gone through.

Intersting article by Mark D'Arcy on the subject on the BBC website  here.

Comments

Jim said…
here is an idea, its quite simple really. Change the current standing for e-mail petitions.

This means when a petition hits 100,000 signatures, that there is more than a "timetabled debate" which may or may not be followed by a parliamentary vote.

Oh, no, this means it triggers a referendum.

Also the bugdget, who ever sets it should also me either accepted or declined by referendum. its the only way forward really.
5:45 pm
Jim said…
I guess that is the point, and it is something that all politicians must learn.

We are not playing anymore, not going to fall for this party is worse than ours so we are your least bad option, in that which we can still control.

I mean come on, lets take the conservative "if there is a conservative majority after the next election then we will let you have a referendum on the EU" - the terms of which have not been set out.

I mean is that really an incentive?

We are already paying back a fortune we don't owe whist the main responsible person still holds a seat in the house of commons, even though he never seems to sit there (being paid by the tax payer) and is not in prison.

We are fed up to the back teeth of the politicians thinking they are " world leaders" they are not, they are a bunch of college kids fighting over which type of sandwich is best.
We are fed up to the back teeth of being told what we must or must not do by these sort of people.
We are fed up of being told what we must or must not pay by these people.
We are fed up of hearing this is right, this is wrong, from these people.

So to be fair, in the end game the vote for UKIP get Milliband, is not so much of a threat. It just means that we hit the bottom that little bit faster than under Cameron really.

I did once have faith in the system but that is long gone, I did once think a new government would hold to cast iron promises, and would also eliminate the deficit in 5 years. Oh dear mother what a fool i was.
6:07 pm
Chris Whiteside said…
WOuldn't be unhappy to see the arrangements for petitions which hit 100,000 signatures given more teeth.

A referendum on the budget might be more problematic. Worth thinking about though.
8:24 am
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