Dr Ruth Dixon looks at how the way legislation is amended can make scrutiny difficult

Ruth Dixon has co-authored an article (12 July) for the PSA Parliaments Group blog examining the challenges to parliamentary scrutiny that are presented when a bill is heavily amended.

Ruth writes, “The scrutiny of legislation and of legislative amendments is an important function of parliament. But what do amendments reveal about the politics of the parliamentary process? The vast majority of agreed amendments are proposed by the government, but why does government sometimes radically alter legislation that it only recently drafted? How much amendment actually takes place, and what implications does that have for parliamentary scrutiny and the quality of legislation?”

The full article can be read here: https://parliamentsandlegislatures.wordpress.com/2017/07/12/visualise-legislative-amendments/