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Free (and Near-Complete) Access to Membership Data from the Select Committee Data Archive, 1979-Present!

Stephen Holden Bates (University of Birmingham), Mark Goodwin (Coventry University) and Steve McKay (University of Lincoln) discuss opening up their select committee data archive for open access research.

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The Study of Parliament Group and the development of specialist select committees, 1964-1985

Professor Gavin Drewry discusses the role of the Study of Parliament Group in the development of specialist select committees in the House of Commons.

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Responding to House of Commons Departmental Select Committees

In the third part of their trilogy examining sessional return data, Stephen Holden Bates (University of Birmingham), Mark Goodwin (Coventry University), Steve McKay (University of Lincoln) and Wang Leung Ting (LSE) explore government responses to departmental select committees.

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Celebrating 40 Years of Departmental Select Committees: two-day conference in June

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.

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Consensus and Division(s) in Departmental Select Committees

Stephen Holden Bates (University of Birmingham), Mark Goodwin (Coventry University), Steve McKay (University of Lincoln) and Wang Leung Ting (LSE), consider the extent to which Commons select committees are based on consensus, in part 2 of their trilogy of blogs drawing on sessional return data. 

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Debating the Effectiveness of House of Commons Departmental Select Committees in Informing the House

Stephen Holden Bates (University of Birmingham), Mark Goodwin (Coventry University), Steve McKay (University of Lincoln) and Wang Leung Ting (LSE) discuss the impact of departmental select committee work on business in the House of Commons chamber.

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Why can’t some select committees get a female witness?

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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Constitutional Scrutiny by Parliamentary Committee

At a time of significant structural change, the UK’s constitutional and political arrangements face unprecedented challenges. There are strong arguments to be made for increasing the level of scrutiny of constitutional reform by accountable bodies, particularly through the vehicle of the Parliamentary Select Committee.  Yet, the number of Committees tasked with examining constitutional matters has decreased; in particular, the Commons Political and Constitutional Reform Committee was not re-appointed following the 2015 General Election.  Drawing on a detailed case study of the work of this unique committee, Dr Eloise Ellis examines the implications of its dissolution for the parliamentary scrutiny of constitutional reform more broadly.

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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.  

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How effective are the Commons’ two committee systems at scrutinising government policy-making?

In addition to their floor debates, a crucial role of legislatures is to scrutinise government law-making and policy implementation. The House of Commons looks at legislation via bill committees, and its select committees cover each of the Whitehall departments to scrutinise implementation. As part of the 2018 Audit of UK Democracy, Patrick Dunleavy and the Democratic Audit team consider how well current processes maintain parliamentary knowledge and scrutiny of the central state in the UK and England.