New UK law: say goodbye to democracy

Off-topic
1

A new bill has passed through the commons. They are chumps and didn’t bother to read the detail like with the ATCS once again. It seems innocuous enough doesn’t it?
http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/regulation/news/2006/060111.asp

But Ministers will be able to make orders that can ‘amend, repeal or replace legislation in any way that an Act of Parliament may do.’


Hitler ruled in exactly the same way. Just because it doesn’t say on the front in big bold letters that it allows ministers to rule by Diktat, doesn’t mean that’s not what it actually does.

Why are people not taking to the streets? Why does nobody seem to care that in the very near future we might not live in a democracy?

More constructively, what can we do about this kind of thing?
My only suggestion now is that people need to know about this in order for any kind of popular opposition to form, so tell everybody!
Any ideas?

2

so wait… they’re letting ministers change and enforce just about anything that they want? and you people ask why i have no faith in the system. i’m just glad i don’t live in england. although being an Australian i am rather pissed about being ruled by the queen. man i hate politics.

3

Yep, the so-called “safeguards” are completely ineffective. A minister would be able to change even constitutional statues at the stroke of a pen :astonished:

Of course, we should all just shut up and trust our politicians. Absolute power is just fine because the people in charge are nice and won’t abuse their power. Who ever said power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely was a liar.

I’m not a great fan of the queen either, but at least we get the tourism revenue…

4

It’s crackers ain’t it! I can’t believe how few journalists have picked up on this. Like you say, where’s the public uproar?

the “safeguards” and limitations on this are totally subjective and utterly useless. Along the lines of: The minister must enact all bills in good faith and with good intention.

I think we’re beyond sleep-walking into dictatorship, I’d say we were at a brisk jog at the least.

5

Well, at least you have been disarmed and nobody will get hurt.

6

“Ruled” would be a bit of a strong term for the arrangement, wouldn’t you say?

Although I seem to remember that whenever there has been a public vote on whether to become completely independent the result has always been in favour of staying under the Monarchy…

Phil

7

This is ridiculas. I have not heard one thing about this. This is insane!

public uproar

Mike

8

They let OWNER-MAN impose oppressive pixel and bandwidth limits on unicyclists, too.

It’s not the first time. silence=death.

“When they came for the unionists, I said nothing, because I was not a unionists. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak…”

9

You Brits are always playing catch up with the U.S.

10

Oh, snap!

11

I’m afraid we’ve stolen a march on you guys this time! The PATRIOT Act has nothing on this, and at least you can see from it’s name that it’s dodgy. When politicians have to spell something out to you you can bet they’re doing the exact opposite (i.e. stealing the freedom they say they’re protecting)

This thing is “The Legislative & Regulatory Reform Bill” No-one can possibly get alarmed at a name like that, and the democracy-stealing part is hidden amongst reams of boring regulatory stuff so nobody will notice until it’s too late.

public uproar

Again, TELL EVERYONE :astonished:

12

I’m seriously not too concerned about this. And I take a reasonable interest in politics and current affairs, I’ve at various times been an individual member of political parties, and I write to my MP and ministers on issues that interest me - so I’m not a head-in-the-sand type.

This bill is clearly intended to relate to regulations. Ministers already have considerable power to amend regulations. It would be totally unworkable for every change of regulations to be scrutinised by parliament. Regulations aren’t the laws themselves, but the details. That could be something as simple as a change to the minimum height of a safety barrier, or the size of the label on a drugs bottle. Think how many such tiny changes and amendments might occur in a typical year.

This law will not allow ministers suddenly to introduce a new law (it is suddenly illegal to ride unicycles; the penalty for murder is now death; that sort of thing) but it will allow ministers to change the minutiae of the rules which really do need amending from time to time.

Parliamentary scrutiny of new laws and regulations is seldom satisfactory anyway. Who believes that 600 or so elected representatives have the specialist knowledge to decide on the correct size for a safety notice, or the correct wording? Of course, they rely on a limited understanding, a few expert reports - and usually vote according to party loyalty anyway.

And ministers are not immune to scrutiny. each cabinet minister is answerable to a select committee which is “cross party” and even the Chancellor (second most powerful elected politician) has to subject himself t periodical “inquisition” by the finance committee.

And we have two opposition parties scratching around for an issue to excite the public and attack an unpopular and untrusted government. Do we honestly beleive that neither of the opposition parties would have raised objections to this bill if its effects were so cataclysmic? The Liberal Democrats, whatever their other failings, have a good profile on civil rights and liberties, and I believe that most of their activists are sincere and passionate on these issues, if sometimes a little misguided.

And we have a press that is broadly hostile to Blair, and constantly on the lookout for evidence of his cronyism and his dictatorial tendencies. Are we to beleive that this is an open goal missed by every editor hostile to the current government?

We do not live in a democracy anyway. We live in a monarchy. We have elected Members of Parliament, and elected local officials. We don’t vote for the Chief Constable, or the local Distric Judge, or the chairman of the local NHS Trust, or any of a hundred other hugely influential figures. What we do have is an active and vociferous press which is always broadly anti-government after the initial post-election honeymoon is over, and a thorough system of parliamentary committees that quietly does the serious line by line scrutiny of rules and regulations, laws and bills and on the whole does a better job of it than the debates in the House.

I listen to the debates in Parliament from time to time. Most of it is ritualistic. That’s not where the real stuff happens.

And if further proof is required, look at the huge fuss made over the egregious Tessa Jowell’s financial dealings, or any random MP’s extra-marital affair, and compare it to the complete absence of fuss in so many other countries over much bigger issues.

Our system is flawed and imperfect, but this bill won’t make it more so.

13

Yes, but that’s because the collective public are idiots.

I just think that the whole “monarchy” is a stupid idea, “I get to be king because daddy was…”. What’s so special about the royal family anyway? Just a bunch of old geezers with fancy buildings if you ask me. Well, maybe if I’m lucky we’ll be a republic by the time I get to vote…or ever.

14

We have regulatory agencies in the US. Their job is to deal with the nitty gritty of how to regulate based on the laws passed by the House, Senate, and President. The regulatory agencies write the regulations within the bounds of the overall laws.

For example, the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) is one such regulatory agency. They regulate food, supplements, drugs, cosmetics, medial devices, and other such things. There are lots of such agencies in the US system. The heads of the agencies are appointed and not elected. This hasn’t destroyed the US system of government.

If the changes to the UK system are giving similar regulatory powers to agencies or ministers then I don’t see it causing any kind of threat to democracy. Franky, I don’t see how a Western style government could function otherwise.

15

Don’t get me wrong, I respect your views and you are obviously well-informed on such issues. I know what secondary legislation is. I know that delegated powers are necessary for our country to function. That is all well and good.
This bill is clearly intended to govern such issues. That’s not the entire story if you read the detail, and you seemed to have missed the point, or at least obscured it under the non-threatening parts of the bill. It gives sweeping powers to amend laws, to the extent that the minister can go completely against the will of parliament and in effect create new law. That tears down humdreds of years of democratic freedoms. Yes, we do live in a monarchy. The monarchy part plays little role in our system of givernment. The royal prerogative hasn’t been exercised directly by the sovereign in recent history, and that isn’t relevant anyway. We have democratic freedoms. This bill goes a long way to destroying what we have won over hundreds of years.
As for relying on the press as a barometer of whether something is important, I think that’s a little naive. They didn’t kick up much of a fuss when internment was reintroduced in 2001 (with a racist twist in that it only applied to foreigners, even though the government admitted there was also a treat from inside the country) Also asylum and immigration laws that in effect left people to die on the streets and were declared to be completely against our constitutional traditions were lapped up by the popular press. So why can we not rely on our own judgement?
This bill is important, I haven’t exaggerated it’s effects as you seem to be implying. Please take a moment to read it at: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmbills/111/06111.1-4.html#j001

You’ll see that it doesn’t just cover delegated legislation as you claim:
3) In this Part “legislation” means a provision of—
(a) any public general Act or local Act, or

So, power to reform any public ganeral Act!!! That is scary. It’s evidently not just about traffic barriers etc.

So that leaves me with the difficult question you raised as to why the media haven’t picked up on it. I can’t answer that with any confidence, but I think you may have hit the nail on the head where you rightly infer that the bill is about regulatory changes and not of constitutional significance. The first part is true, but bills can have multiple purposes, and taking the general gist of a bill without reading the detail probably led to the commons missing out on this. Most MP’s don’t bother to read bills in detail before they vote. It probably slipped under the press’s radar in the same way. That’s my best guess anyway.

On a final note, I know several law professors who are extremely worried about this. They know what they’re talking about, and personally I’d trust them over making inferences from press silence any day.

Respectfully,
Matt

16

Whether or not you believe the current government would abuse this law is irelevent.

What if UKIP got into power or, the BNP (worse case senario). They would definately abuse these powers.

Should any government have this power?

AndyC

17

Unfortunately, most people are not concerned enough to do much. Lack of interest will have it’s price though. Who owns the media? Who tells us what we hear? Who do we trust? Politicians? World leaders?

The world as we know will be destroyed, and believe it not, it’s the best thing for the survival of this planet.

18

No need to apologise for disagreeing! That’s freedom of speech. And as I’ve said elsewhere, no one ever learned anything by winning an argument - including me.

I see from your profile you are lucky enough to really be 23; I just wish I was.:frowning:

One (dis)advantage of middle age is you’ve heard that the end of the world is nigh so many times you stop believing it. Look at the fuss over bird flu. Looking back, I recall similar fusses over vCJD, necrotising fasciitis, and rabies. It was “inevitable” that rabies would get into Britain by the early 1980s. We’re still waiting.

Likewise with various acts of parliament. The “sus” laws of the late 1970s, the alleged attempt to make Morris dancing without a licence illegal a couple of years ago, compulsory bicycle helmets (imminent in 1979, I recall) and so on.

My view is that all governments, and this one in particular, make too many laws. The dafter the laws, the harder they are to enforce. They can’t even enforce the sensible one that makes it illegal to burgle someone, or the equally sensible one that makes it illegal to steal a car. 20% of cars in the St. Ann’s area of Nottingham are untaxed, and more than that are uninsured.

Be assured that the first time that a minister abuses this power, the sleeping giant of public opinion will be roused. The media sometimes follow, and sometimes lead public opinion, but they never go against it - and the opposition is just looking for a chance to put clear blue water between them and the government.

One of my best mates is a professor. Great at theory. Can’t change a fuse in a plug.

19

In the unlikely event that either of these barmy minorities got into power, if they wanted such a law, then surely they could introduce one anyway?

No laws last for ever, and neither does the absence of a law.