Legislation is another important role of parliament. In the year of 1999-2000 parliament spent an astonishing 40% of their time spent on legislation. Legislature is basically the passing of laws in the House of Commons, however all they do is pass the laws. The general ideas generate from cabinet, if the laws and/or bills have cabinet’s backing then they are more likely to be passed. The Government (party in power) and the opposition have the opportunity to scrutinise these before they are passed. The opposition would generally try to have the proposed bill thrown out. Even though legislation is considered an important function of parliament political scientists such as Norton criticise this because
When scrutinising the bill it is held in the House of Commons with the government and opposition, the opposition is made up of mainly the conservative party the lib-Dems and sometimes the Scottish activists.
Norton’s theory of parliament being split up in to five categories is the same for all assemblies in general.
Aside from scrutiny and legislation parliament also has other roles, one of them being recruitment. Recruitment is the idea that the Primeinister is selected/recruited form parliament. He therefore gets to pick his ministers, who will obviously agree with his views and ideas. However he has to pick his ministers from the House of Commons. There is no legislation to say that he cannot recruit other people outside the House of Commons, however it is a convention whish states you cannot recruit people from the outside. This is the idea of separation of powers
State power depends on legitimacy. The sovereign power of a state depends not only on its capacity to coerce; it also rests on the recognition by citizens has authority or right to exercise power over those who live there. This concept is commonly called legitimacy, the third of five major roles of parliament as stated by Philip Norton. It would be extremely difficult for a state to survive it did not command this legitimacy. Britain, like most other large communities with sophisticated and advanced economies, is far to too complex a society to be governed by force. Legitimacy is not a concept it is a belief, a belief to make certain that we, the public believe in it and that it is lawful. The belief of legitimacy has been a tradition for many years and will so over many more years. It may not be identified by Norton as one of the major roles of parliament, however it is a rather significant role of parliament. An example would be general elections, it makes it legitimate and it is traditional. Therefore the successful elections indicate that it is successful and adds an air of legitimacy.
Finally, the fifth major role of parliament is representation. Representation is the idea that a particular MP should govern each state/borough. The idea of representation is the notion that those who are governed should have the opportunity to be involved in the process of government. This is the idea that the public have more of a say on how government is run and have more of a relationship with its government if they have their own representative from government who will represent them and their beliefs. On Fridays each MP have the day off to talk to constituents.
In conclusion Norton outlines the 5 major roles of parliament, which are; legitimacy, scrutiny, representation, recruitment and legislation. These five different categories apply for all assemblies on general. Norton’s idea of parliament coincides with the concept of government through parliament not government by parliament. Although parliament as a whole is extremely important, perhaps its most significant role is scrutiny as this is where bills are either passed or thrown out, which also links to legislation, therefore the majority of parliament time is spent on scrutiny and legislation.
