Government is being stifled by committees
ARLIAMENTARY committees have multiplied in number and grown significantly in power and influence over the past decade. Their rise was largely inspired by the example set by high-profile Congressional hearings in the US political system. Many MPs now spend a far greater proportion of their working hours on committee work than on debates in the Commons chamber.
Yet within Whitehall concern is developing that there are now far too many committees clogging up the process of government. Ministers and civil servants face continual demands to appear before committees and to provide information for multiple inquiries. And that sense of overload is likely to be felt most keenly on the Brexit issue as Theresa May moves towards formally applying for the country to leave the EU and beginning the twoyear negotiation for a departure deal.
A report published by the Institute for Government think tank this week noted that Commons committees have already launched 18 potentially overlapping inquiries into the effect of leaving the EU, with a further 13 under way in the Lords – and that is before Mr Benn’s Brexit committee has even begun work. Dr Hannah White, the report’s author, warned that scrutiny of Brexit “risks becoming a chaotic competition for the limelight, diverting huge amounts of ministerial and official time which might have been better spent elsewhere”.
INSIDERS complain that parliamentary inquiries already risk impeding the Brexit process. While Foreign Office civil servants have been ordered to complete their preparatory work for the Brexit negotiation by Christmas, some claim that having to respond to frequent committee demands is getting in the way.
The irony is that Britain’s EU membership has also contributed to the flourishing of the Westminster committee system. MPs who had surrendered so much of their legislative power to Brussels used committees as an alternative way of spending their time and spreading their influence. By reversing the process and sending sovereignty back from Brussels to Westminster, Brexit might be expected to lead to a renewal of the power and prestige of the Commons.
MPs are set to regain legislative responsibility from EU bureaucrats and will have more than 40 years of Brussels regulations to unpick. Perhaps they will grow less interested in grandstanding on committees as a result. And the frustrated MPs who crave the public eye might be better off following Mr Balls on to the Strictly set.