Can Parliament Hold Executive To Account?

Question 1

1A: House of Lords

Answer 1

Spends 50-60% of time in house scrutinising bills. Usually around 1,000-2000 amendments are made a year, and some of them make substantial differences to bills, for example, the Identity Cards Act 2006 was amended after multiple defeats in the HOL, it eventually ended up in govt conceding that the ID cards not be compulsory and rather completely voluntary. Further, the Lords may affect how govt brings about bills due to the idea of anticipated reaction, modifying it before or not bringing it forward at all if risk of opposition. The expertise of members in the lords means their amendments is respected

Question 2

1B: House of Lords

Answer 2

The Parliament Act 1911 means HOL cannot physically prevent legislation, and can only delay it for a year, this was displayed in the overriding of the HOL’s decision to ban fox hunting, leading to Hunting Act 2004, so really they are just suggestions. Furthermore, the Salisbury Convention states HOL cannot block manifesto pledges, which are likely the most significant forms of legislation.

Question 3

2A: select committees

Answer 3

Select committees are merely recommendations to the govt, if it is not politically convenient, they will likely just ignore the committee. Fire example in Jan 2021 the Work and Pensions select committee put forward recommendations to fix flaws in Universal Credit. The govt said there is no need for a starter payment and refused to research links with psychological distress. Essentially it was useless. Also many committees don’t get media attention as they aren’t really debated and not many people have time to read reports so there is no real accountability

Question 4

2B: select commitees

Answer 4

the Covid questioning in Science and Technology Committee in 2021 allowed Cummings to give 7 hour evidence scrutinise govt response to Covid, this one highlights to electorate deficiencies of current government but also allows future govt to learn from mistakes.
This level of detail, media coverage and expertise makes it hard for govt to ignore, leading to 45% of select committee recommendations being implemented

Question 5

3A: opposition

Answer 5

As the govt have the majority in parliament, opposition days may raise issues but are very unlikely to result in actual policy changes, for example although the ban on fracking policy raised by Stsrmer in 2022 generated public support, Liz Truss’s majority voted no, so no result came.
Furthermore opposition days are usually more adversarial than substantive, it is not true accountability rather point scoring on specifics

Question 6

3B: oppistion

Answer 6

Opposition usually wish to overtake the govt in next election, so they usually fiercely oppose the govt in the hope they cause panic as “parties do not win elections, governments lose them”
Further PMQ’s allow the govt to be questioned right in front of the public, being forced to justify and explain policy.

Question 7

Has c