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The state of our Parliamentary democracy - IT HAS TAKEN 3 MONTHS TO ALLOW A QUESTION TIME!
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TALKING POINT
Strange but true, but it has taken 3 months for a Question Time to be allowed in our Parliament.
In fact, Question No. 1 of 2009 will be asked when Parliament resumes today. That is the state of our Parliamentary democracy.
Over the years, PANORAMA has been drawing attention to this deplorable situation, but there has been no improvement. There are two or three question times a year - and that's that.
Yet, there are those who think we have the best Parliament in the world!
The best?
This state of political play does nothing to enhance the reputation of our Parliament. It means that when Questions are again allowed, after a lull of several months, the Opposition come up with an inevitable accumulation of questions - 404 on this occasion.
In the first place it is not in the public interest to have so many questions in one go - and many of the questions grow stale during the long wait for an opportunity to arise that will allow questions to be asked.
Can this state of affairs be in the interest of Parliamentary democracy? Of course not.
But why is something not done to rectify this state of affairs?
There is no need for a constitutional conference to increase the number of times that questions are asked. So, why is something not done?
It was recently announced that a select committee of the House had been created to look into iomprovements for Parliament.
That's fine. But many of the improvements that are possible do not even require a select committee of the House to arrive at decisions and conclusions.
Besides, a committee will simply delay what could be done far more quickly to improve the situation.
So, there we are.It has now taken 3 months before question time is allowed in our Parliament. What a carry on!
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