Central Government

Parliament – consisting of the House of Commons and the House of Lords – is a scrutiny body, subjecting government decisions to analysis, discussion and debate through a variety of different means.

One way is through the scrutiny of Bills (draft legislation). Bills have to go through several stages of scrutiny and debate before they become law, and Parliament has a number of opportunities either to amend, or reject outright, the legislation being proposed. In practice, Government majorities both in Parliament and in parliamentary Bill committees mean that substantial alteration can be unlikely, although it depends on the nature of the proposals.

In the 2007-08 parliamentary session a new system of publishing Draft Bills to enable evidence to be gathered by a Draft Bill Committee from external sources in a manner similar to Select Committees was introduced. This had the stated aim of enhancing the scrutiny to which legislation is subjected, by enabling debate on the principles behind the draft legislation, rather than the line-by-line amendments which usually form the focus of debates in traditional Bill Committees.

In the Houses themselves, scrutiny is carried out through debate and discussion. Another way is through the system of Parliamentary select committees, which exist in both Houses of Parliament. The Commons and the Lords have a number of these committees, many of which mirror the responsibilities of Government departments. Each is supported by a small team of staff including specialists in the area of policy being scrutinised. Select committees have wide powers to require people (generally, Ministers and senior civil servants) to attend to give evidence. Based on evidence gathered through this and other methods, select committees produce reports on matters of public importance which influence executive decision-making more widely. 

Select committees set their work programme with reference to a set of “core tasks”, which have been used since 2002 to define how topics should be selected and how time and resources should best be used.