What Next in Constitutional Reform? Implementing the Governance of Britain Agenda

1
What Next in Constitutional Reform?Implementing
the Governance of Britain Agenda

• Andrew Le Sueur
• Queen Mary, University of London
• a.lesueur_at_qmul.ac.uk
• 12 December 2007

2
The Governance of Britain project

• PM's House of Commons statement 3/7/07
• Green Paper (Cm 7170)
• "In a nutshell, it is about making the Executive
  much more accountable to Parliament and making
  Parliament more accountable to the people, and I
  really mean that" (Jack Straw MP, to HL
  Constitution Committee 23/10/07)

3
Consultations

• Role of the AG (Cm 7192)
• Judicial appointments (Cm 7210)
• War powers and treaties (Cm 7239)
• Managing Protest Around Parliament (Cm 7235)
• Lord Goldsmith's Citizenship Review -- various
• British Statement of Values local, regional and
  national events, and opportunities for the public
  to deliberate and debate, using a wide range of
  mechanisms
• Early 2008 Consultation paper on British Bill of
  Rights and Duties
• Early 2008 Speaker's Conference

4
Draft bills during 2007-08 Session

• Pre-legislative scrutiny of
• Draft Constitutional Renewal Bill
• Draft Citizenship and Immigration Bill

5
Draft Constitutional Renewal Bill process

• Expected March 2008 (but slippage possible)
• Likely to have pre-legislative scrutiny by Joint
  Committee
• Joint Committee report, Government response
• Bill "proper" introduced in 2008-09 Session

6
Constitutional Renewal Bill contents

• AG
• Deployment of armed forces (if convention
  rejected)
• Parliamentary role in relation to ratification of
  treaties
• Civil Service
• Reform of judicial appointments
• Confirmation hearings for some public
  appointments
• Intelligence and Security Committee
• Abolition of prerogative of mercy
• Abolition/reform of other prerogative powers?

7
Other legislation

• House of Lords Bill (to create 'substantially or
  wholly elected' second chamber)
• Elections (review of voting systems voting days)
• Amendment of Serious Organised Crime and Police
  Act 2005
• Rights of charities to campaign
• Further reform of prerogative powers

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Not requiring legislation

• Draft legislative programme published in spring,
  ahead of Queen's Speech
• Possibly deployment of troops
• Commons approval of PM's decision to seek
  dissolution of Parliament
• Majority of MPs to request recall of Parliament
• Limiting Ministers' powers relating to honours
• Annual debates on Department's objectives/plans

9

• 9 Ministers for English regions, with Commons
  select committees
• Concordat between central and local government
• Ministerial Code
• Public petitions to the House of Commons

10
British Statement of Values

• Michael Wills (Minister of State, Ministry of
  Justice) . it is not just the formulation of
  the statement that matters, but what it will be
  used for. That will be for the British people
  themselves to decide. They are going to
  deliberate and debate, and in the final stage of
  the processa citizens summitthey will decide
  not only what the statement should be, but what
  it should be used for, subject to the views of
  Parliament. (HC Hansard 24/10/07)

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Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire,
Conservative)

• Will the Minister please translate his first
  answer into plain English? Will he tell us how
  much all this gobbledegook is costing, and
  precisely what the nonsense of a citizens summit
  is supposed to mean? (HC Hansard

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Medium longer term reforms

• British Bill of Rights and Duties (draft Green
  paper now with Ministers to be published early
  next year)
• ' a concordat between the executive and
  Parliament or a written constitution'