How representative is Parliament?

The first 200 words of this essay...

How representative is parliament?

A major function of parliament is representation which is basically that the MP is the elected representative of his or her constituency and it can be seen that are representative of political opinion in their constituency, it can also be seen that parliament is a good representation of the majority vote of the country and that its policies are representative of current events and feelings within the public. However it can be argued that parliament is not socially representative of society, the voting system FPTP limits representation and the House of Lords is unrepresentative as it is controlled by the elected party by the power of patronage rather than being representative enough to scrutinise effectively.

One way it can be seen that parliament is unrepresentative is with social representation. It can be argued that parliament is extremely unrepresentative socially and that this affects the legitimacy and limits the houses function of representation. For example, the electorate is 50% female but in the HOC only 20% of its MP's are female. This means that women are underrepresented and as a result matters that apply specifically to women could be miss-handled or even ignored which