Tag Archives: house of lords delegated powers and regulatory reform committee

Lords signals its intent to change controversial section of Public Bodies Bill

By Mark Pack | Wed 24th November 2010 - 8:55 am

Last week I wrote about the Public Bodies Bill and the power grab it makes to let the government change the law in future without proper Parliamentary control, similar though on a smaller scale to what Labour proposed previously with the so-called Abolition of Parliament Bill. David Howarth echoed these concerns at the weekend:

The Public Bodies Bill might not presage the end of parliamentary democracy in the way the 2006 Bill did, but it is a sloppy, lazily drafted bill that assumes, just as the 2006 Bill did, that those in power are all good chaps who would

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Posted in News | Also tagged david howarth, lord norton and public bodies bill | 4 Comments

Abolition of Parliament: it was wrong then and it’s wrong now

By Mark Pack | Fri 19th November 2010 - 8:56 am

Back when Tony Blair was Prime Minister Labour tried to get through Parliament sweeping powers to change the law without requiring full Parliamentary scrutiny. Then Liberal Democrat MP David Howarth was one of those who led the charge against this, writing in The Times:

The Government proposed an extraordinary Bill that will drastically reduce parliamentary discussion of future laws, a Bill some constitutional experts are already calling “the Abolition of Parliament Bill”.

A couple of journalists noticed, including Daniel Finkelstein of The Times, and a couple more pricked up their ears last week when I highlighted some biting academic criticism of the

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