THS MUST BE STOPPED

[HERA]

Blair's plan to abolish Parliament


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-2049791,00.html

[xmasdale]

Now we see his true colours.

He hasn't quite reached Hitler's "absolute power for life" but he's marching in that direction.

Noel

[TRUTH]

INTRODUCTION

1. These explanatory notes relate to the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill as introduced in the House of Commons on 11 January 2006. They have been prepared by the Cabinet Office in order to assist the reader of the Bill and to help inform debate on it. They do not form part of the Bill and have not been endorsed by Parliament.

2. The notes need to be read in conjunction with the Bill. They are not, and are not meant to be, a comprehensive description of the Bill. So where a clause or part of a clause does not seem to require any explanation or comment, none is given.

SUMMARY AND BACKGROUND

3. Part 1 provides a power for a Minister of the Crown to make orders, which replaces the power in the Regulatory Reform Act 2001 ("the 2001 Act") to make Regulatory Reform Orders ("RROs"). It sets out the type of provision that can be made, the conditions and restrictions on the power, and the procedure which must be followed in making such an order.

4. The impetus for this Part comes from the Government's review of the first four years of the operation of the 2001 Act, which was completed in July 2005 1. The review was informed by detailed feedback from Government departments which have been involved in the making of RROs under the 2001 Act, and by the findings of the Better Regulation Task Force ("the Task Force") contained in its report Less is More: Reducing Burdens, Improving Outcomes, published in March 2005 2. The Task Force's report (at page 42) made some recommendations as to what the Government's review of the 2001 Act should cover.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmbills/111/en/06111 x--.htm

Select Committee on Regulatory Reform

Regulatory Reform - First Special Report

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmdereg/878  /87802.htm

The Select Committee on Regulatory Reform have produced this report between the first and second reading.

This is the summary of the above report.

The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill [HC111], which is expected to have its Second Reading on 9 February, has the potential to be the most constitutionally significant Bill that has been brought before Parliament for some years. It needs to be scrutinised with particular care.

The Bill is promoted by the Cabinet Office as providing a means for Ministers to increase the pace of implementing the government's Better Regulation agenda. According to the Government, Part 1 of the Bill, which is the focus of this special report, seeks to tackle red tape and unnecessary regulations. This will be achieved by radically increasing the scope and power of the process of legislating by Order and by circumventing elements of the current parliamentary procedures. In broad terms, Part 1 of the Bill provides Ministers with a wide and general power to amend, repeal and replace all primary and secondary legislation, including legislation that may have been approved recently. There are few limits to this power. As with Regulatory Reform Orders (RROs), this power will be exercisable by means of Ministerial orders, but, it is now proposed that it will sometimes be subject to only negative resolution procedure. The Bill also provides Ministers with the power to change the common law by order.

Like the 2001 Regulatory Reform Act (RRA), which the Bill will replace, the Bill provides certain safeguards, but compared with the RRA, these safeguards and limits have generally been significantly reduced. For example, unlike under the RRA, the scope of the power will not be limited by a requirement on the Minister to identify "burdens" that will be removed or reduced. Also Ministers will not be prohibited from repealing, amending or replacing legislation that is less than two years old or from making orders that themselves sub-delegate the power to legislate. As under the RRA, the orders will be scrutinised by parliamentary committees, which will probably be successor committees to the Regulatory Reform Committee (RRC) in the Commons and the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee in the Lords. But compared with the current procedures, the Government is proposing a fast track procedure for some orders without including a converse power of the Committees to reject an order on the grounds that it is inappropriate for secondary legislation. It is expected that what safeguards are provided will be reinforced by Ministerial assurances. Overall, the proposed safeguards that are in the Bill are important, but in our view they are unlikely to provide sufficient counterbalance to the increased Ministerial powers that the Bill provides.

In view of the constitutional significance of Part 1 of the Bill, we have decided, despite the short time between First and Second Reading, to produce this report in order to report our views to the House in time for the Bill's Second Reading.

SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmdereg/878  /87808.htm

Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (Programme)

That the following provisions shall apply to the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill:

Committal

1. The Bill shall be committed to a Standing Committee.

Proceedings in Standing Committee

2. Proceedings in the Standing Committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion on Thursday 9th March 2006.

3. The Standing Committee shall have leave to sit twice on the first day on which it meets.

Consideration and Third Reading

4. Proceedings on consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour before the moment of interruption on the day on which those proceedings are commenced.

5. Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption on that day.

6. Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees) shall not apply to proceedings on consideration and Third Reading.

Other proceedings

7. Any other proceedings on the Bill (including any proceedings on consideration

of Lords Amendments or on any further messages from the Lords) may be programmed.—[Mr. Cawsey.]

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2006-02-09a.1103.3&s=Legisla tive+and+Regulatory+Reform+Bill

Those voting Aye agreed that the scrutiny of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill by the Standing Committee would be finished by Thursday 9th March 2006. There was no vote after the Second Reading debate.

Following this scrutiny the Report Stage and Third Reading debates on the floor of the House would would be scheduled for only one day, with the latter debate lasting an hour.

This scheduling is in accordance with Standing Order 83A, but with the summary decision that Standing Order 83B would not apply. This rule specifies how a committee of MPs appointed by the Speaker is supposed to decide how to schedule the Third Reading debate. There is no point in writing a rule that can be withdrawn from this easily.

The timetable for dealing with any amendments to this Bill to emerge from the House of Lords would be set later.

The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill has been called the "Abolition of Parliament Bill" by several leading lawyers because it appears to give the Government an unrestrained ability to rewrite laws as it chooses without passing them through Parliament.

http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/division.php?date=2006-02-09&number=157

[TRUTH]

Legislative reform

Sir, Clause one of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (Comment, Feb 15) provides that: “A Minister of the Crown may by order make provision for either or both of the following purposes — a) reforming legislation; b) implementing recommendations of any one or more of the United Kingdom Law Commissions, with or without changes.”

This has been presented as a simple measure “streamlining” the Regulatory Reform Act 2001, by which, to help industry, the Government can reduce red tape by amending the Acts of Parliament that wove it. But it goes much further: if passed, the Government could rewrite almost any Act and, in some cases, enact new laws that at present only Parliament can make.

The Bill subjects this drastic power to limits, but these are few and weak. If enacted as it stands, we believe the Bill would make it possible for the Government, by delegated legislation, to do (inter alia) the following:

# create a new offence of incitement to religious hatred, punishable with two years’ imprisonment;

# curtail or abolish jury trial;

# permit the Home Secretary to place citizens under house arrest;

# allow the Prime Minister to sack judges;

# rewrite the law on nationality and immigration;

# “reform” Magna Carta (or what remains of it).

It would, in short, create a major shift of power within the state, which in other countries would require an amendment to the constitution; and one in which the winner would be the executive, and the loser Parliament.

David Howarth, MP for Cambridge, made this point at the Second Reading of the Bill last week. We hope that other MPs, on all sides of the House, will recognise the dangers of what is being proposed before it is too late.

PROFESSOR J. R. SPENCER, QC
PROFESSOR SIR JOHN BAKER, QC
PROFESSOR DAVID FELDMAN
PROFESSOR CHRISTOPHER FORSYTH
PROFESSOR DAVID IBBETSON
PROFESSOR SIR DAVID WILLIAMS, QC
Law Faculty,
University of Cambridge

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,59-2042165,00.html

[TRUTH]

This is the text of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill, as amended in Standing Committee A in the House of Commons and ordered to be printed on 9th March 2006.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmbills/141/06141.i- ii.html