A collaboration of academics and parliamentary practitioners has resulted in a new book, the second edition of Exploring Parliament, which seeks to make what can sometimes seem like an arcane and impenetrable institution more comprehensible to students and the general public alike. In this post the book’s editors, Cristina Leston Bandeira, Alexandra Meakin and Louise Thompson, explain why the book is necessary, and what readers can expect from its second incarnation.
Continue readingTag Archives: Alexandra Meakin
Restoring and renewing parliamentary buildings fit for parliamentary diplomacy
Debates about the future of the Palace of Westminster have focused on whether MPs can keep sitting on the green benches in the Commons but, as Cherry Miller and Alexandra Meakin explain, a meeting of the EU-UK Parliamentary Partnership Assembly has highlighted the broader use of the building, and its role in defining an image of the UK to the rest of the world.
On 4–5 December, the UK parliament hosted the fourth meeting of the EU–UK Parliamentary Partnership Assembly, a body set up to oversee implementation of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement. A delegation of 35 MEPs (and staff) visited the UK parliament, meeting with 21 MPs and 14 peers to discuss ‘the state of play within the Partnership Council’; a recommendation on mobility of people; breakout groups on data protection, fisheries, and citizens’ rights; artificial intelligence and climate change. Innumerable side meetings were also held on the parliamentary estate and there was a reception in Speaker’s House. In the previous visit to Westminster, in November 2022, visiting delegates had the option of attending a tour of the parliamentary estate.
The UK Parliamentary Partnership meets in the UK parliament for prestige, minimising costs and maximising attendance (of the UK delegation). The meeting has twice been held in Committee Room 14, a historic setting of the 1922 committee. At the 4 December meeting, co-chair Oliver Heald MP apologised to attendees in his opening remarks:
‘I would like to give you a warm welcome, although this room is not as warm as we would like. We have asked that the windows be closed but they can’t do it tonight because it requires a ladder and all sorts of equipment, but they are bringing an extra heater and I do apologise. It’s a nice historic building, but there is that problem, that it’s a bit cold’.
(PPA, 04/12/23)
Many parliamentarians and staff sat in coats, scarfs (and gloves, for some). Parliamentary staff deftly worked to ameliorate this situation, locating and wheeling in portable heaters. Despite the cool temperature, the mood in the televised plenary was, in general, convivial. One MEP joked there was a need to ‘put another 50p in the meter’ and metaphors about the freezing and thawing of EU–UK relations abounded. However, this raises broader issues about parliamentary diplomacy and Restoration and Renewal, as discussed below.
Continue reading‘Our travel difficulties haven’t been well-understood by the Government’: life as an MP from the smaller opposition parties during the pandemic
Parliament has been forced to adapt its procedures and practices to the new environment created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Here, Louise Thompson and Alexandra Meakin outline how smaller parties have been disproportionately affected by the decisions that the government has made about how parliament should operate during the pandemic.
Legislatures across the world have had to adjust to new ways of working during the coronavirus pandemic, and the UK parliament is no different. All 650 MPs have seen their role transformed as they have adjusted to virtual and then hybrid proceedings in the House of Commons, remote and then proxy voting, the loss of the informal spaces for chats and networking, and moving constituency surgeries and meetings online. For a particular subsection of MPs, however, the last year has brought even more challenge and complexity. We argue that the changes to proceedings and operation of the Commons since March 2020 have disproportionately affected MPs from the smaller opposition parties, highlighting a failure in the decision-making structure to sufficiently take into account the circumstances of these MPs. This failure, we contend, risks delegitimising the Westminster parliament in the eyes of people living in the devolved nations.
The typical view of the House of Commons, with the government on one side and the official opposition on the other, reflects the traditional two-party dominance on the green benches. But if you look to the opposition benches, you will see a growing number of MPs representing smaller parties. Some 73 constituencies (that’s 11% in total) are now represented by parties outside this duality. The smaller parties range in size, from the 47 SNP MPs, to the sole representatives of the Alliance Party and Green Party. They differ politically too: the pro-EU Lib Dems and the Brexiteer Democratic Unionist Party share the same small-party benches. But regardless of size or ideology, all small parties and their MPs must deal with an institution designed, both physically and in its rulebook, with an emphasis on the two larger parties, something that this last year has demonstrated well.
The constituencies represented by the 73 small-party MPs are overwhelmingly concentrated outside of England, with 89% located in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Even in normal times, travelling to Westminster for these MPs almost invariably involves far longer and more complex journeys than for members representing English constituencies. The pandemic has exacerbated this, with public transport (literally the only option for MPs in Northern Ireland or the Scottish islands) cut drastically. In June 2020 the number of flights from Belfast to London, for example, fell from 12 a day to just one. Virtual participation in the Commons at this time was severely restricted, but the timing of the flights and difficulties securing tickets meant that MPs from Northern Irish constituencies were often unable to be present in the Commons chamber for the first items of business on a Monday or stay for business on Thursdays without being stuck in London (and away from their families and caring responsibilities) all weekend. For one Urgent Question on abortion in Northern Ireland, Alliance MP Stephen Farry had to ask another MP (the Scottish Liberal Democrat, Wendy Chamberlain) to speak on his behalf as he was unable to travel to Westminster at short notice (at this date, no virtual participation was allowed).
Continue readingThe Constitution Unit blog in 2019: a year in review
As was the case last year, 2019 has been a fascinating time to be writing about the UK constitution, its institutions and those involved in working within them. As the year draws to a close, blog editor Dave Busfield-Birch offers a roundup of the blog year just gone, as well as a look at the reach of the blog through the lens of its readership statistics.
2019 has been a year of constitutional flux and tension, with a new Prime Minister, a new Brexit deal and a new parliament, with a significant number of new MPs. The blog has benefited both in terms of increased general interest as a result, but also because there are niche topics being discussed in public now that would have generated little interest in other years. Few, for example, would have predicted in June 2016 that prorogation of parliament would be a hot topic and pose a constitutional dilemma that only the Supreme Court could solve.
Below are our most popular blogs from the past year, which follow a personal selection from me, at the end of my second year as blog editor.
Editor’s picks by category
Brexit
Brexit and the constitution: seven lessons, by Jack Simson Caird.
Written back in June, but still relevant today, the Bingham Centre’s Jack Simson Caird discussed how the process of exiting the European Union has revealed that the relationship between law and politics was perhaps not as sound as it might once have appeared, and what lessons that had to teach us.
Parliament
Leaving the European Union, leaving the Palace of Westminster: Brexit and the Restoration and Renewal Programme, by Alexandra Meakin.
This may well have been the post that I found most fascinating this year (in a very tight contest). Alexandra Meakin (now Dr Meakin — many congratulations) discusses the relationship between the UK’s upcoming departure from the EU and the plans for MPs and peers to temporarily move out of the Palace of Westminster. Her analysis shows that there is a correlation between an MP’s stance on Brexit and their position on how best to handle the restoration and renewal programme.
I also want to offer a special mention to the trilogy of articles on the role of parliamentary legal advisers and the desirability of publishing their advice, which you can read here, here and here. They make fascinating reading, despite (in the case of the first two) coming to oppposite final conclusions.
Elections, referendums and democratic engagement
Is there an app for that? Voter information in the event of a snap election, by Joe Mitchell.
Digital technology has transformed the way we access information and interact with services. Democratic services have not kept up, risking a situation where democracy is seen as out of date. Joe Mitchell argues that it’s time to dream big: the UK has an opportunity to create a new digital-first office of civic education and democratic information, to restore trust and grow public understanding of our democracy. Continue reading
Placing the public at the heart of the Restoration and Renewal of the Palace of Westminster
Progress on the Restoration and Renewal (R&R) project has been slow, but despite the time taken, there has been limited engagement with the public on the issue. Alexandra Anderson, Alexandra Meakin and Matt Flinders express optimism that amendments to the legislation responsible for R&R indicate a promising change of direction, creating an opportunity not to simply restore and protect the past but to embrace a positive vision of the future.
It is now three years since a Joint Select Committee warned that ‘The Palace of Westminster, a masterpiece of Victorian and medieval architecture and engineering, faces an impending crisis which we cannot responsibly ignore’. This crisis, the Committee continued, was likely to be a catastrophe, such as a major fire or flood, or a succession of failures of the infrastructure, leaving the building unusable. There can now be no doubt about the validity of this warning: since the Committee reported we have seen the House of Commons flood during a debate, a ‘football-sized lump’ fall off the Victoria Tower, and wardens are currently patrolling the building twenty-four hours a day to address the regular outbreaks of fire (now totalling 66 in the last decade). As the then Leader of the Commons, Andrea Leadsom, told MPs in May — referring only to the instances of crumbling masonry — ‘It is only through luck that none of them has led to any serious injuries or even fatalities’. If any further warning was necessary, the tragedy of Notre Dame in April demonstrated the potential devastation of fire.
This week has marked a significant step forward in plans for a major renovation, aimed at keeping the building—and the visitors, parliamentarians, and staff within it—safe from disaster or tragedy. The Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Act 2019, which has now received Royal Assent, will establish the necessary governance bodies so that the planning work for what will be a multi-billion, multi-decade project can begin in earnest.
Not only will the Act offer the best opportunity for preventing a crisis hitting the Palace, it also offers the opportunity to place the public at the heart of this renovation: the Restoration and Renewal (R&R) Programme. This is hugely significant. The original text of the legislation (and the projects associated with the wider programme) were designed to address only the crisis of the building, and not the broader crisis of UK democracy. Amendments tabled in the House of Lords and approved by the Commons on Monday have ensured that public engagement will be an integral part of fixing the Palace. Continue reading