Author Archive: democraticaudit
Reports of Parliament’s decline much exaggerated
Andrew Blick, 31st May 2011 The last decade has seen a series of significant innovations in the way Parliament holds government to account, mostly involving the House of Commons, but in some cases the House of Lords as well. They include: More resources for select committees; The introduction of ‘core tasks’ for select committees in the Commons […]
Do referendums ever resolve constitutional debates?
Stuart Wilks-Heeg The result of the AV referendum has been widely argued, most obviously by opponents of change, to have ‘settled the issue’ of electoral reform. With a few notable exceptions, includingChris Huhne, prominent supporters of a ‘Yes’ vote have done relatively little to challenge this argument. The consensus appears to be that the issue of electoral […]
Postal voting and electoral fraud
Stuart Wilks-Heeg, 26 April 2011 Malpractice accusations are now almost part of the UK’s election calendar. Every Spring, in the week or so before local elections, and just after the dispatch of postal ballot to voters, media reports of electoral fraud allegations begin to trickle in. Invariably, the vast majority of cases are reported to […]
Are public school boys still running Britain?
Stephen Crone: an edited version of this post was first published on the LSE British Politics and Policy Blog on 11 March 2011 When it was broadcast in January, Andrew Neil’s documentary,Posh and Posher: Why Public School Boys Run Britain, received an almost universally positive reception – both on the left and theright. Many apparently agreed with its main […]
What would be the constitutional consequences of Lords reform?
Andrew Blick, 24th May 2011 The details of the government’s new proposals for House of Lords reform are certain to generate much discussion over the coming months, if not years. In the short-term, we can expect hundreds of hours of Parliamentary time to be devoted to discussing issues such as: the choice of electoral system; […]
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