Dr Mark Bennister of the University of Lincoln provides an incisive account of last week’s Liaison Committee. The piece considers the quality of scrutiny and the effectiveness of the Prime Minister’s performance during the session.
Tag: Liaison Committee
Dr Sarah Wollaston, Chair of the Liaison Committee, discusses its new report into how the system of select committees can operate more effectively, both in terms of their place within the House of Commons and their external impact, in a blog originally posted on The Constitution Unit. New ways of working and more powers are suggested, such as taking a ‘digital first’ approach to reports and formalising formalising further the arrangements for the Prime Minister to appear before the Liaison Committee.
Rebecca McKee and Tom Caygill report back from the House of Commons and the Study of Parliament Group conference marking 40 years of departmental select committees.
In their nearly-eponymous 1995 hit, Reverend Black Grape, I’m a Celebrity runners-up and Bargain Hunt cheats, Black Grape, asked ‘Can I get a witness?’ In 2019, why is it that some select committees seemingly find it difficult to get female witnesses to give evidence at their sessions? Some of the answer may well be found in the gendered make-up of the committees themselves.
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Pre-appointment scrutiny hearings
In September the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee published their report into Pre-Appointment Scrutiny Hearings. Robert Hazell gave evidence to the committee’s inquiry on the subject; here he discusses the report’s conclusions, and describes the events that led to its being undertaken, including two Constitution Unit studies that evaluated the effectiveness of such scrutiny.
In evidence to the House of Commons Liaison Committee this week Theresa May discussed the Restoration and Renewal of the Palace of Westminster. Alexandra Meakin discusses the importance of government support for the R&R programme.
In the second of our blogs from our 2017 conference, Legislatures in Uncertain Times, Ruxandra Serban, UCL, discusses different procedures used to hold Prime Ministers to account in 32 parliamentary democracies.
On the last afternoon of the final parliamentary session before the Christmas recess, Theresa May could put it off no longer and appeared before the Liaison Committee. Here Ben Worthy, viewing the session from outside, considers how she performed. Mark Bennister, utilising his new parliamentary academic fellowship looks at the Committee performance having watched the session from the Committee room.
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Essay competition 2016 – result
This spring, the Parliaments and Legislatures SG held the first essay competition open to all undergraduate students. This essay competition was open, where students were asked to write about a parliament, legislature, or a specific matter concerning legislative studies.
The members of the judging panel were Michael Rush (Exeter), Lynn Gardner (House of Commons) and Richard Whitaker (Leicester). They judged the essays on four criteria (originality, rigour, strength of analysis and quality of presentation/style). The essays were anonymised and so the panel did not know which university each essay represented.
We are very pleased to announce that the winning essay was by UCL University student Sam Holcroft (nominated by Meg Russell), for the essay on “How much control should political parties have over their members in parliament? And how much do they have in practice?”. Sam will receive a prize of £150. You can read his essay here.
The runner-up was Matthew Robinson (Surrey University, nominated by Louise Thompson) for an essay on “Does the Liaison Committee scrutinise the Prime Minister more effectively than MPs at Prime Minister’s Question Time?”. You can read his essay here.
Thank you to all that took part in the competition. We very much hope to continue the competition in future years to help promote our knowledge of parliaments and legislatures and encourage people to learn more about them.
Please note that this piece was originally published on the PSA Insights Blog, available here.
By Leanne-Marie McCarthy-Cotter
Following from yesterday’s launch of the report ‘Building Public Engagement: Options for Developing Select Committee Outreach’, Dr Leanne-Marie McCarthy-Cotter (The Crick Centre, University of Sheffield), discusses the findings from her, Prof. Matthew Flinders and Prof. Ian Marsh’s research. The research was commissioned, and published, by the Liaison Committee. You can access the report in full here.