Constitutional Reforms & Government Power

Arguments in favour of this statement include:

Devolution means power has been taken away from UK Parliament
Human Rights Act gives more power for judges to assess laws and challenge government
House of Lords is more willing to be assertive against government after hereditary peers reduced
Creation of the Supreme Court has made the judiciary more independent
Power to call elections has been removed from the PM

Arguments against this statement include:

Power is still concentrated in UK Parliament, despite devolution (powers can be removed from devolved bodies)
Human Rights Act is not fully entrenched and can be overturned by legislation
House of Lords is still subservient to Commons, and can only delay bills
Government may be more likely to last due to fixed-term act, and this can be overridden anyway, as Theresa May showed in 2017

Explain, with examples, constitutional reforms that have taken place since 1997. (6 marks - calls for two paragraphs!): Your answer should include: Devolution / Human / Rights / Lords / Constitutional / Reform / Fixed-term

Debates on Further Reform

Should the House of Lords be elected?

Arguments in favour include:

It would be more democratically legitimate, so has more of a right to make and challenge laws.
It allows for more representation, for example by having elected representatives serving longer terms than MPs, perhaps chosen by a different electoral system
The Lords would be more willing to introduce its own legislation, and could more robustly challenge bills from the Commons, so leading to better legislation
It could properly check the power of the Commons, as it would have the right to do so
There would be more effective restrictions on government power, as it would be less easy for the government to pass legislation

Arguments against include:

Lords members can currently be chosen on the basis of their specialist knowledge and experience. This would likely be lost if Lords were elected
It could lead to gridlock- if the Commons and Lords were in disagreement, it would not be clear which has priority. This would be especially problematic if the chambers were dominated by different parties. Therefore, the executive would find it harder to get things done
There is no need to have two elected chambers. The Commons is elected and has authority, and the Lords works fine as a revising and checking chamber
Members of the Lords would rely on parties to get elected, making them more likely to be influenced by their party and less likely to think for themselves
It would be harder to ensure that the Lords represents society- at the moment, Lords can be appointed on the basis on (for example) their gender or ethnic background, to give particular groups in society a voice. This could not be guaranteed if the Lords were elected

Should the Westminster voting system be reformed?

Arguments in favour include:

FPTP is not proportional- the percentage of seats won by parties does not reflect the percentage of the vote they received. This is undemocratic
FPTP creates lots of safe seats and wasted votes
Governments currently win power with only 35-40% of the vote, so are not supported by most of the population
It currently leads to few checks and balances on government power, as governments can easily pass legislation
Under FPTP, power becomes concentrated too narrowly, and small parties do not get the level of representation their support merits

Arguments against include:

Reforming Westminster elections was decisively rejected by the public in the 2011 referendum
FPTP gives voters a clear choice between two parties with distinct programmes for government
Under FPTP, winning parties get overall majorities, so can fulfil their manifesto pledges without the need to compromise in a coalition
FPTP allows for strong governments- governments have a healthy majority and can get things done
FPTP allows for stable governments- single-party governments are less likely to collapse, so provide certainty and stability
Extremist parties are unlikely to get a foothold under the current system