Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Coalition tries Labour's "Abolition of Parliament" trick?

There is, quite rightly for once, concern from Liberal Conspiracy about a Bill the Coalition is trying to bring forward in Parliament called "The Public Bodies Bill". The purpose of the Bill officially is to enable to abolition of quangos, but according to the House of Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, it also has clauses in it which extend the power of the Executive to,
rewrite the statute book, with inadequate parliamentary scrutiny of, and control over, the process... The Bill confers powers on Ministers to make very significant changes. All orders under the Bill may amend or repeal any Act of Parliament.
I agree that this should be stopped, but it should also be noted that we've been here before. Back in 2006, the last Labour Government tried to introduce the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill which also gave ministers similar powers. Then a couple of years later it was back with the Draft Constitutional Renewal Bill which gave ministers' the power to,

amend, repeal or revoke any provision made by or an Act
This is an old trick and it deserves, absolutely, to be stopped. However, Labour supporters really ought to acknowledge the reality that the Labour Party, just like the Coalition, were guilty of trying to slip these sort of powers onto the statute books too.... twice.

Frankly, they're all power-grabbing bastards.

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