Parliamentary Law Making Process Model Answer

• Every proposal for a new Act of Parliament must be agreed by elected Members of Parliament in the House of Commons, hereditary or life peers in the House of Lords and the reigning Monarch of the time, before becoming an Act of Parliament. This is known as the Legislative Process.
• It starts with a pre-legislative process. There will then be a consultation stage where proposals for new legislation are published as a Green Papers. These are consultation documents which gather feedback for interested parties on the proposal so that parliament can ensure that their ideas for law making are well received and any ideas for changes can be implemented. An example of a Green paper was the 'High speed rail' paper issued in March 2010.
• After the green paper, the Government will gather all of their feedback and make necessary amendments to their ideas. They will then write down their firm proposals of what the proposed law should include in a White Paper. This is issued publicly and allows for further consultation and final amendments to be made before a Bill is drafted to be given to Parliament.
• There are various types of Bill that lawyers in the Civil service from the Parliamentary Counsel to the Treasury will draft. The majority of bills introduced each year are Public Bills which are created by the Government and affect the whole country or a large section of it. They are very successful as they have the backing of the Government.
• Private Member's Bills are introduced by individual MPs. They are introduced either by ballot; where 20 MPs are selected to present their Bill, or by the ten minute rule. Few become law because there is a shortage of debate time allocated to them although the Abortion Act 1967 that was introduced by David Steel is a prime example. Private Bills only affect individual people or corporations. An example if the Marriage Enabling Act 1980 which allowed a stepfather and stepdaughter to marry if they met when they were adults.
• A bill can start in either House, most will start in the House of Commons (HOC) and Finance Bills must start here. The first stage is a formality and known as the First Reading, where the name and main aims of the Bill are read out, eg the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill 2017. A verbal vote is taken and if the 'Ayes' have it then the Bill will progress to the next stage.
• Following this is the Second Reading where the main debate on the main principles occurs. MPs who wish to speak must catch the 'Speaker's eye.' At the end, a vote is taken to see whether the bill should progress to the next stage. Usually, this is formal with members leaving the Chamber and walking down the 'aye' or 'no' corridor. There must be a majority in favour of the Bill for it to progress.
• The next stage is the Committee Stage where a standing committee of 16-50 MPs with a special interest in the bills topic or knowledge of the subject of the Bill will analyse/scrutinise the Bill word by word, line by line, clause by clause etc. Members of the group will proportionally represent the numbers of sears each party has in the HOC. For Finance Bills, the whole of the HOC will sit for this stage and it is usually undertaken by the whole House in the House of Lords. Members of the Committee will propose amendments or additions to the Bill.
• Any amendments must be reported and brought to the House's attention in the Report Stage, where they will vote on whether to implement the amendments. This stage is 'a usual safeguard against a small committee amending a bill against the wishes of the House and a necessary opportunity for second thought' however if there are no amendments then this stage will not take place.
• After this is the Third Reading where a final review of the bill and vote is taken. If 6 or more MPs request then further debate will take place but this rarely happens. The Bill is unlikely to fail at this stage and so if the bill passes this stage then it will be passed to the 'Other House' so from the HOC to the House of Lords (HOL) or vice versa where all of these stages are repeated.
• A bill can be returned to the original chamber for amendment and this can lead to a 'ping-pong' situation where a Bill is being passed back and forth between the two Houses. This was seen with the Nationalities and Borders Bill, where the House of Lords rejected proposals twice.
• Should the HOL wish to block a Bill they can do so for one year (one month if a Finance Bill) under the 1911 and 1949 Parliament Acts. After this the HOC are able to reintroduce the Bill, take it through the stages again and pass it for Royal without the permission of the HOL which happened with the Hunting Act 2004, but this very rarely happens.
• Finally, the Bill will be sent for Royal Assent where the Monarch will given formal approval of the bill. The last time a Monarch refused to do this was in 1707 so it is now a mere formality.