Controls Exercised over DL by Parliament Model Answer

• Delegated legislation is the process of laws being created by authorities other than the Government. The power, authority and limitations as to what Delegated Laws can be made are contained within the Parent Act the Legislation is being made under, which is created by Parliament.
• As Parliament are passing their powers to others and they are the Supreme Law Making body in the country, they must be able to control the Legislation. Parliamentary Controls over Delegated Legislation include; Affirmative Resolutions, Negative Resolutions, Committee Scrutiny and Parent Act approval. All but Parent Act Approval can only be used for Statutory Instruments.
• Firstly, Affirmative Resolutions are a relatively similar process to that of the Bill Process in Parliamentary Law Making. An Affirmative Resolution involves the Statutory Instrument being presented to both the House of Commons and House of Lords. This must be down with 28 to 40 days of the Statutory Instrument being created by the relevant Ministerial Department.
• Once placed into the House, the Peers and MPs must review the Statutory Instrument, discuss this and hold a vote. To become Delegated Legislation, the Statutory Instrument must pass the voting process in both Houses. Failure in either will result in the proposal not becoming Legislation. Affirmative Resolutions are only used for new Statutory Instruments and cannot ammend older, established Legislation.
• The Negative Resolution process is the most common way of creating a Statutory Instrument. Here, the Statutory Instrument is against presented to both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, so that any Peer or MP may scrutinise the proposal for new Legislation. The Statutory Instrument will remain available for 40 days and if no motion to annul the delegated legislation is put down then it will automatically become an active Law.
• If any MP or Peer does object to the Statutory Instrument, they can raise an objection and call for a 'Prayer.' This will trigger a vote to reject the Statutory Instrument from becoming Law. If the vote is successful the Statutory Instrument will not become law.
• Scrutiny of Statutory Instruments can be done by the Joint committee on Statutory Instruments. This is made up of MPs and Peers and it is their job to review and check the Statutory Instruments. Once they have reviewed a Statutory Instrument, if there are issues with it, the Scrutiny Committee are able to refer it back to Parliament for further actions.
• However, this can only be done if the Statutory Instrument; goes beyond the power given in the 'Parent Act', is badly drafted, creates Retrospective Law, or creates a tax. If any of these situations arise, the Scrutiny Committee can refer the Statutory Instrument back to Parliament, but they cannot change it as Parliament are the only ones with the power to do this.
• Approval of the Parent Act is one of the main controls of Delegated Legislation. The Parent Act which Delegated Legislation is created under outlines the limits to which Delegated Legislation can be made by the delegated bodies. Therefore, if Parliament have approved the initial piece of Legislation through the in-depth Parliamentary Law Making process, it can be said that they have control on what Delegated Legislation can and cannot be made.
• As a Parent Act should set out which Government Ministers are able to create Regulations, the type of Laws which can be made and who they affect and whether any other parties must be consulted in the process, the limitations of the Parent Act control what can and cannot be done in the process of creating Statutory Instruments. This is an ongoing control over the Statutory Instrument as at any time, Parliament have the right to repeal or amend the powers outlined in the Parent Act, meaning they effectively have the ongoing control over the powers, who they are available to and their limitations