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Parliament Carries Out None Of Its Func

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Parliament Carries Out None Of Its Func
“Parliament carries out none of its functions adequately”. Discuss. (40 marks)

With democracy on the incline and other countries catching up to where the UK once lead it can be argued that parliament does not carry out its functions adequately. Many would say there are not enough checks and balances on the government to insure its parliament is run legitimately being argued that a cross on a ballot paper every four years is hardly a true expression of our will. Current circumstances have lead to his enquiry of the people, most significantly the freedom of information act 2000 introduced by Blair’s government allowing transparency and putting the government under some scrutiny resulted in the daily telegraphy uncovering the expense scandal, including the duck house this exploitation of the government sparked an unanimous felling of not only anger but also disappointment bringing the questioning of the effectiveness of parliament. However not all of parliament can be looked upon in negative light, parliament can be seen as efficient and it is unfair to claim that “none” of its functions are adequate because the surely there would be a collapse in parliament and government.

Predominately and most obviously parliaments “main function” is legislation and passing bills, and in all fairness that’s what parliament does, far more bills are efficiently passed through parliament and become law compared to the US who struggle to pass anything with such a variation of opinions. The majority government that Britain almost always has, despite labour government in 1974-79 which was weak and short lived, always been able to provide stability and efficient law-making; a core function of parliament. Counter-arguing this it could be suggested that such a strong majority government who does not have to debate or compromise in laws could eventually result in an elective dictatorship, meaning that we are effectively controlled by the government on a vote that was made for 4/5

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