The Constitutional Convention Bill was a bill introduced in the British
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
by
Graham Allen MP on 22 July 2015 and never went past the first reading. The bill was also introduced in the
House of Lords
The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster ...
by
Lord Purvis of Tweed
Jeremy Purvis, Baron Purvis of Tweed (born 15 January 1974) is a Scottish Liberal Democrat politician. He was the Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale from 2003 to 2011. In August 2013 it was announced ...
and reached committee stage.
Aims
Under the bill, the following would be established:
* A Constitutional Convention would be created as a deliberative state organ.
* A position of Secretary of State for the Constitutional Convention would be created.
* The Convention would consider and make recommendations on further
devolution to Cornwall, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales - specifically in legislative and fiscal matters, as well as the devolution of legal, political, electoral, and fiscal competence to local authorities.
* The Convention would also consider and make recommendations on the reform of the electoral system (for all election types), the House of Lords, House of Commons, and local government, the role of the monarchy, Crown Dependencies, and British Overseas Territories, and matters and procedures to govern further conventions and constitutional reforms.
* And that these aims would be released within a year upon the bill being given
Royal Assent
Royal assent is the method by which a monarch formally approves an act of the legislature, either directly or through an official acting on the monarch's behalf. In some jurisdictions, royal assent is equivalent to promulgation, while in othe ...
.
Origins
The Constitutional Convention Bill was first mentioned of in the
Labour Party Manifesto for the
2015 General Election
This national electoral calendar for 2015 lists the national/Federation, federal elections held in 2015 in all List of sovereign states, sovereign states and their Dependent territory, dependent territories. By-elections are excluded, though na ...
.
The driving factor behind the Bill was the fact that the Labour Party had been pushing constitutional reform, as well as the left-wing movement in general (see the
House of Lords Reform Bill
The House of Lords Reform Bill 2012 was a proposed Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom introduced to the House of Commons in June 2012 by Nick Clegg. Among other reforms, the bill would have made the House of Lords a mostly elected bod ...
), and that there had not been a single constitutional document in the United Kingdom - rather a series of laws and agreements promulgated over centuries, like the
Magna Carta
(Medieval Latin for "Great Charter of Freedoms"), commonly called (also ''Magna Charta''; "Great Charter"), is a royal charter of rights agreed to by King John of England at Runnymede, near Windsor, Berkshire, Windsor, on 15 June 1215. ...
and the
Act of Settlement
The Act of Settlement is an Act of the Parliament of England that settled the succession to the English and Irish crowns to only Protestants, which passed in 1701. More specifically, anyone who became a Roman Catholic, or who married one, b ...
(1701). This is a similar attempt to compile relevant legislation, comparable to when the
Brown Ministry
Gordon Brown formed the Brown ministry after being invited by Queen Elizabeth II to form a new administration following the resignation of the previous Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, on 27 June 2007. Brown formed his governm ...
was working on the
Equality Act, which was given
royal assent
Royal assent is the method by which a monarch formally approves an act of the legislature, either directly or through an official acting on the monarch's behalf. In some jurisdictions, royal assent is equivalent to promulgation, while in othe ...
in 2010.
Composition
The Constitutional Convention would be composed of representatives of the nations and regions, the local authorities, and registered political parties. There was a quota of 50% percent of convention members that must not be in any employment that could be considered political.
Related pages
*
House of Lords Reform Bill 2012
The House of Lords Reform Bill 2012 was a proposed Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom introduced to the House of Commons in June 2012 by Nick Clegg. Among other reforms, the bill would have made the House of Lords a mostly elected body. I ...
References
{{Reflist
Proposed laws of the United Kingdom
2015 in British politics