A further clear way in which parliament is able to scrutinize the government and policy making process is through the use of Prime Minister’s question time which occurs every Wednesday. In this 1 hour slot, members of the House of Commons are able to quiz the current Prime Minister on a wide range of political issues, although it often focuses on current government policy and affairs. Although this may sound like a clear way in which the activities of the Prime Minister and his cabinet are brought to account, in reality questions from opposition MP’s are required to be submitted to the Prime Minister in advance of the question time, giving him time to consult cabinet colleagues, government advisors, and senior civil servants. Thus because of this time lag between the submission of the proposed questions to the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister’s question time itself, it would be naïve to suggest that this method of scrutiny is fully effective in bringing the activities of the Prime Minister and his cabinet colleagues to account. Furthermore, it is clear that members of the Prime Ministers government may be able to use Prime Minister’s question time as a means of strengthening the perception of the government in the mass media by simply asking questions which highlight the successfulness and not failures of the government’s policies and initiatives.
Arguably one of the most successful ways in which the powers exerted by government can be monitored and constrained through parliament exists through the use of both standing and select committees. “The New British Politics” (I, Budge, I Crewe, D McKay, K Newton 1998) defines standing committees as:
“Committees of the House of Commons that examine bills after their second reading in order to make them more acceptable for their third reading”.
The composition of standing committees is directly proportional to the distribution of seats in the House of Commons, therefore provided that the government has a positive parliamentary majority, they can expect to have majorities in each of the House of Commons standing committees. Therefore, similarly to debate and discussion in the House of Commons, standing committees provide a medium by which opposition MP’s are able to scrutinize the legislative function of the government in parliament by actively partaking in the process of amending and creating legislation. However in reality, due to the stringent system of party whipping and strong party loyalties apparent in the contemporary British political system, it is almost certain that government MP’s will follow the courses of action favored by their party, whether in standing committees, or similarly in votes on bills in the House of Commons, rather than risking harsh disciplinary action as is often the case when government MP’s act against the wishes of their party. Thus it would be fair to say that although standing committees do allow opposition MP’s the chance to scrutinize the legislative functions of the government of the day, because of the fact that the government is likely to have an inbuilt majority’s in each of the committees, the extent to which this is likely to be effective is compromised.
Once more, “The New British Politics” defines select committees as:
“Committees of the House of Commons and the House of Lords that consider general political issues which are wider than a particular piece of legislation”. Thus select committees in the Houses of Parliament monitor and scrutinize the executive functions of policy formulation and implementation by government rather than solely its legislative functions. Select committees usually remain a feature of governmental scrutiny on a permanent basis once they are created, for example the Public Accounts Committee. The composition of select committees remains the same until a new government is elected, in which scenario the existing members are replaced to reflect the change in government, or simply change in government majority in the House of Commons. As select committees focus on specific policy areas, it can be argued that they are an extremely useful tool available to parliament, in scrutinizing individual areas of the policy making process. However, it has been apparent on occasions in the past, that respective governments may have withheld information to various select committees which could have been proved extremely damaging to the government’s reputation. For example, the investigation of the Westland helicopter affair by both the Defence, and the Trade and Industry select committees was hampered by the fact that the government refused access to a number of top civil servants who were actively engaged in the affair. Furthermore, similarly to standing committees, as the composition of select committees reflects the distribution of seats in the House of Commons, it is likely that the majority of committees will seek to protect the public image of the government, provided that the government has a parliamentary majority.
Despite the fact that I have provided evidence for a wide range of ways in which parliament is able to scrutinize both the executive and legislative functions of government, it is often argued that much of the policy making process occurs behind closed doors, and in consultation with a number of unlikely sources rather than with opposition parties in the House of Commons. In her most recent book entitled “The Silent Takeover” (2001), Norina Hertz argues that much of the policy making process occurs in close consultation with multi-national companies, and that the primary function of government policy is to pursue the goal of global economic growth.
“In the twenty-first-century world of global capitalism, while nations compete for investment flows and the jobs and growth that corporations can provide, and politicians need ever greater funds to compete with their rivals to win over the electorate, governments actively do what they can to promote the interests of business”.
This is clearly supported by the fact that the New Labour government is now primarily funded by wealthy individuals and large multi-national companies rather than by trade unions as was traditionally the case. Thus if this were taken to be true, it would be clear that parliament would have a very limited role in scrutinizing policies created by the government, as much of the policy making process would be undertaken behind closed doors, and with minimal consultation with opposition parties in parliament.
From the information that I have provided in this essay, it seems apparent that the ability of parliament to scrutinize government and the policy making process directly depends upon the size of the government’s parliamentary majority. As I mentioned before, governments with large majorities such as Blair and Thatcher, are likely to have little constraint from parliament in formulating and implementing policy. Furthermore, as strong governments can be said to have a mandate from the electorate to formulate and implement policies which are featured in their election manifesto, the most likely way in which the activities of government can be scrutinized is likely to exist as the perception of the government by the general public, usually referred to as public opinion. It is also apparent that the powers of parliament to scrutinize the government and the policy making process are unlikely to be realized under the current First Past the Post voting system which almost guarantees large parliamentary majorities for newly elected governments. Thus I believe it would be fair to say that under the current contemporary British political system, it is clear that parliament has insufficient powers to scrutinize the activities of government as well as the policy making process itself which is supported directly by the arguments and evidence I have presented in this essay. It could be argued that one way in which the abilities of parliament to scrutinize government and the policy making process could be widened, would be to alter the composition of both select and standing committees so that the government in power would not have a majority in each committee, and thus the activities of government could more easily brought to account. A further way of increasing the aforementioned powers of parliament could be to pass legislation to overturn the Official Secrets Act of 1989 and the culture of secrecy apparent in the contemporary British political system, forcing governments to disclose information on sensitive political issues to parliamentary committees, and bringing the activities of government to light more effectively.
Bibliography
The Silent Takeover – Norina Hertz (2001), published by Arrow Books, London.
The New British Politics – I Budge., I Crewe., D McKay., K Newton (1998), published by Pearson Education Limited, Edinburgh.
Leeds University Website – http://www.leeds.ac.uk