The Parliamentary Contribution to Democracy Essay

The Parliamentary Contribution to Democracy - Essay Example Parliament is the essential and definitive link between the citizen and the government and should therefore be the cardinal institution of any nation's democratic system. Genuine representative democracy is possible only in a country with a strong Parliament. A strong Parliament ensures a good and accountable government endowed with a robust and sensitive law making mechanism. The citizens of a country have a say in the decisions that affect their lives only when a strong Parliament is in existence in that country. Over a period of time, Parliament's power to hold the Executive to account has been on the decline irrespective of the political character of the Government involved. Important legislation becomes law after being subjected to cursory investigation and this allows the entry of laws which have been poorly drafted and ill thought through. This has been the experience in the United Kingdom. The domination of the Legislature by the Executive has assumed great importance and it has been generally conceded that, the Executive dominates the Legislature and that any discussion in this regard concerns itself mainly with the level of this dominance. Such studies have in the main concentrated on the parliament's performance in the legislative process and there is a discernible neglect of other key functions of parliament such as scrutiny for example. The diminishing role of Parliament and the increasing power of the Executive in the British political system has been the subject of many discussions and a number of concrete remedies have been suggested by various authorities. Inter Alia, these authorities have frequently referred to a so called golden age when the balance between legislature and executive was more equitable. "The argument appears to start from a misinterpretation of what the role of Parliament has been in the past which is a question of description or what the role ought to be is a question of prescription. This lacks the evidence of past commentators, like Mill or Bagehot which always correctly interpreted. Indeed, the lessons of history itself are not infrequently misapplied"2 The Liaison Committee had submitted two reports, in order to clarify its views on the discussion taking place in respect of the relationship between Parliament and the Executive3, these reports are Shifting the balance: select committees and the executive, or the 1st report of 1999-2000, HC 300, March 20004 and Independence or control or the 2nd report of 1999-2000, HC 748, July 20005. Although the primary focus of the Committee's attention is the select committee system6, it addresses this in the overall context of the executive-parliamentary relations, as can be seen from its conclusions in the first report. These conclusions state that twenty years have elapsed since the setting up of the departmental select committees and that their establishment was a major step in making the Executive accountable to Parliament, and ultimately to the citizen and the taxpayer. Although, these committees had done a lot of important work their full capability had been neither realized nor