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August 01, 2008
"Ragbag" of Constitutional Reforms Not Bold Enough
A Joint Committee report was published yesterday on the Government's Constitutional Reform Bill, part of Gordon Brown's Governance of Britain programme.
A minority group in the committee, comprised of three Tory MPs, two Lib Dem peers and a Labour peer have been heavily critical of the Bill and the majority report, for not going far enough, in regard to the separation of the legal and political roles of the Attorney General. They acccused the 11 other members of "endorsing what amounts to a continuation of the status quo" on this issue.
Lord Tyler dismissed the Bill as "neither constitutional nor renewing" and has predicted that Browns "ambition to reinvigorate our democracy will never be realised by the ragbag of retreats embodied in his constitutional renewal bill".
On the Our Kingdom Blog, Andrew Blick has highlighted some progressive elements such as the establisment of a 'Joint Committee on Treaties' which could oversee the treaty negotiation as well as parliamentary scrutiny. Ultimately, however the Bill along with the Governance of Britain programme, has proved to be a disappointing set of reforms that do not go far enough.
That final point also reflects the general view of the Committee as well. The report recommended that the long title of the Bill be changed as, if it were to be published as it is, there would be little scope for the debating wider issues surrounding constitutional reform.
That would be good news for us, as if the long title were changed there would be an opportunity to bring electoral reform into the debate.
Update: this post has been amended to take into account comments received and for clarity.
Posted by robrankin on August 01, 2008
Comments
Your post misrepresents what Lord Tyler has said. His reference to endorsing the status quo refers to the section of the report on the role of the Attorney General, not to the report as a whole. The report does not endorse the status quo. If one reads in particular the final chapter of the Joint Committee´s report one will find a notable critique of the Draft Constitutional Renewal Bill and the extent to which it fails to live up to the expectations generated by ´The Governance of Britain´Green Paper and the extent to which its name is a misnomer.
Posted by: Lord Norton of Louth at August 1, 2008 05:01 PM
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