Playing by the rules

January 19, 2014, By KNews, Filed Under Features/Columnists, Peeping Tom, Source

Parliament does not always have to be an alcove of confrontation. At the same time, if the opposition and the government were to agree to everything, the very essence of parliamentary democracy would be undermined.

As was evident last Thursday, there are many things on which all the sides can agree and which can be passed with unanimous support.

Thursday was one day in which the sides agreed to some things. And while this is what most of the people want to see happen, this trend is not expected to continue for long. It was nice that both sides could have agreed to amendments to the laws relating to firearms and to the introduction of evidence in the Courts.

It was nicer to see the opposition not voting down laws which they knew would have originated in the Ministry of Home Affairs. The government showed that it was flexible and asked the Attorney General to introduce the Bills, no doubt to avoid a showdown with the opposition had it been introduced by the Minister of Home Affairs.

The opposition in turn did not have to lose face and showed compromise by approving the Bills, even though they knew that it came from within the Ministry of Home Affairs. The situation was helped because of the fact that the Bills themselves would have enjoyed support from both sides.

However, there are far too many and far too important issues on which the two sides of the National Assembly do not see eye-to-eye. When this happens, it leads to confrontation, with the opposition shooting down Bills introduced by the government.

The National Assembly is of course the place where debate on policy and legislation takes place. And debate and agreement are not synonyms. There are bound to be differences between the sides and there will be occasions when the two sides will not be able to agree. This has been the tradition with all parliaments in the world.

It is therefore not necessary that all sides agree with one another. It is more important that the government respects the right of the opposition to shoot down legislation introduced by the government, and that the opposition respects the right of government to introduce legislation and to refuse to assent to Members’ Bills.

As previously explained, the opposition should not introduce Bills without the consent of the government, because to do so would be to effect policy changes, which is the proper role of the Executive and not the opposition.

The opposition should not, for example, be trying to introduce any laws of the country, unless this is done with the support of the government, because to make changes without this support constitutes the opposition abrogating to itself the role of the government, whose responsibility it is to set the legislative agenda of the country and determine what laws are introduced and what are not.

The government on the other hand should respect the opposition’s right to refuse to support any law introduced by the government. This is a right that all opposition parties hold, regardless of whether they have a one-seat majority or hold a four-seat minority. Whether it is a Bill that allows Guyana to meet its international obligations or it is simply a refusal to amend some local law, the opposition has a right to oppose measures.

The government may rant and rave and accuse the opposition of all manner of things, including sabotaging national development. But so long as the government respects the right of the opposition to note negatively on any issue, then parliamentary democracy for all its shortcomings will remain intact.

In due course, the Courts will decide on whether the opposition has the right to amend the Budget or whether it merely, under our Constitution, is empowered to either approve or disapprove the estimates as a whole.

Both the Executive and the Legislature are subject to the Constitution, of which the Court is the guardian. Parliament, therefore, while it is free to set its own internal rules, does not enjoy the prerogative to abrogate the provisions of the Constitution, and is bound to comply with any ruling that indicates that it is in violation of the Constitution.

Once the separation of powers is not respected, there exists the risk of undermining parliamentary democracy, because parliamentary democracy requires an acceptance of the principle of separation of powers.  Playing by the rules will not rule out confrontation or disagreement, but will ensure that there is no threat to parliamentary democracy and constitutional rule.