On 12 September, the day after the EU (Withdrawal) Bill received its second reading in the House of Commons, this major one-day public event brought together leading parliamentarians and legal and constitutional specialists from across the UK to discuss the critical issues raised by the Bill and its prospects in the UK’s parliaments and assemblies.
are available on the UK in a Changing Europe website.
Professor Anand Menon, Director, ESRC UK in a Changing Europe
The Government's approach
Daniel Denman, Director, Legal Advisors, Department for Exiting the EU
Legislating for Brexit: the issues
Professor Sionaidh Douglas-Scott, Anniversary Chair in Law, Queen Mary University of London
Chair: Dr Ruth Fox, Director and Head of Research, Hansard Society
Michael P. Clancy OBE, Director, Law Reform, Law Society of Scotland
Professor Mark Elliott, Professor of Public Law, University of Cambridge; Legal Adviser, House of Lords Constitution Committee
Lord Lisvane, Member, House of Lords Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee; former Clerk of the House of Commons
Chair: Marie Demetriou QC, Brick Court Chambers
Professor Catherine Barnard, Professor of European Union Law, Cambridge University, and ESRC UK in a Changing Europe
Martha Spurrier, Director, Liberty
Chair: Professor Dan Wincott, Professor of Law and Society, Wales Governance Centre, Cardiff University
Professor Colin Harvey, Professor of Human Rights Law, Queen's University Belfast, and ESRC UK in a Changing Europe
Dr Jo Hunt, Reader in Law, Cardiff University, and ESRC UK in a Changing Europe
Professor Stephen Tierney, Professor of Constitutional Theory, Edinburgh University, and ESRC UK in a Changing Europe; Legal Adviser, House of Lords Constitution Committee
Chair: Professor Richard Rawlings, Professor of Public Law, University College London, and Honorary Distinguished Professor, School of Law and Politics, Cardiff University
A panel (subject to parliamentary business) including:
Hilary Benn MP, Chair, House of Commons Committee on Exiting the EU (Labour)
Sir Bill Cash MP, previous Chair, House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee (Conservative)
Joanna Cherry QC MP, Member, House of Commons Committee on Exiting the EU (SNP)
Dr Stephen Farry MLA, Deputy Leader and Brexit spokesman, Alliance Party
Eluned Morgan AM, Baroness Morgan of Ely, Member, National Assembly for Wales External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee (Labour)
The event is funded by the ESRC UK in a Changing Europe initiative, and co-convened by Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre and the Hansard Society.
The Rwanda Bill has made it over the parliamentary finishing line but not without some last-minute drama. We talk to the SNP’s Alison Thewliss MP about what went on in a small room, behind the Speaker’s Chair, away from the cameras!
To mark the Hansard Society’s 80th anniversary we are launching the Churchill-Attlee Democracy Lecture in honour of our first members, Winston Churchill and Clement Attlee. The inaugural lecture will be given by former Prime Minister the Rt Hon Theresa May MP. This is a fundraising event for our 80th Anniversary Appeal. Date & location: Tuesday 14 May 2024, 7:00-8:15pm, Westminster (venue to be announced) Tickets: £25
With a general election on the horizon there has been a spate of new legislation and regulations to implement changes to the way the election will be run, with consequences for voters and electoral administrators. Parliament has not always had a role in approving these changes. This briefing sets out the core changes to the electoral process that have been implemented since the last general election in 2019, the role that Parliament has played in scrutinising and approving them, and the risks arising from these changes.
The Climate Change Act 2008 established a framework for setting carbon budgets every five years. But the role of Parliament in approving these budgets has been widely criticised, including by the Prime Minister. The Environmental Audit Committee has proposed improvements in the scrutiny process to ensure effective climate action, particularly in the context of the UK’s commitment to achieving 'Net Zero' emissions by 2050. These reforms will significantly alter the way Parliament handles the Seventh Carbon Budget in 2025.
The Government’s flagship Tobacco and Vapes Bill will ban the sale of tobacco to anyone born after 2009. The genesis of the delegated powers in the Bill – dating back a decade - tells an important story about the way in which incomplete policy-making processes are used by Ministers to seek ‘holding’ powers in a Bill, only for that precedent to then be used to justify further, broader powers in subsequent Bills. This ‘creeping’ effect in the legislative process undermines parliamentary scrutiny of ministerial action.
