by Miriam Cates, Conservative Home
As a general rule, the parliamentary timetable is controlled by the government of the day, making it virtually impossible for individual MPs to make new laws. Private Members’ Bills (PMBs) are the exception to this rule and, since their invention in the 19th Century, have been used by backbenchers to introduce all sorts of legislation that would otherwise never have seen the light of day.
PMBs are normally niche in nature, addressing issues of personal interest to particular MPs, such as the Shark Fins Act (2023) or the Coinage (Measurement) Act (2011). PMBs are expected to be narrow in scope, since they qualify for far less parliamentary time and therefore significantly less scrutiny than government bills. Debated on Fridays – when MPs are routinely engaged in constituency business – PMBs can easily be blocked by the Government, and fewer than one in 20 makes it onto the statute book.
Lacking civil service support and forbidden from increasing public spending, PMBs are suited to the introduction of legal ‘tweaks’ rather than wholesale reform. Nevertheless, the lightweight nature of the PMB process has, on a number of occasions, been hijacked to introduce radical legal change with little scrutiny.