Disadvantages of Delegated Legislation

1. What does the volume of delegated legislation make it difficult to do?

The sheer volume of delegated legislation (between 3,000 and 4,000 Statutory Instruments a year and hundreds of thousands of bylaws makes it hard to keep track of changing laws.

2. What is an issue relating to publicity?

Added to this problem is the fact that many of the changes are rarely debated or publicised.

3. What is it no defence to plead?

However, it is no defence to plead “ignorance of the law” and therefore there is a possibility of ordinary people falling foul of rules that they did not know existed.

4. Is delegated legislation democratic?

As Ministers are unelected and largely unaccountable to the public e.g. Lord Mandelson, it can be argued that delegated legislation is a less democratic source of law.

5. What is the exception for bylaws.

This is largely true with the exception of bylaws where the public have their say in local elections.

6. What theory does delegated legislation contradict?

Another disadvantage of delegated legislation is that it directly contradicts the theory of separation of powers.

7. What is the separation of powers theory?

This states that Parliament (as the public’s elected representatives) should be the only law makers (legislative branch).

8. Through delegated legislation, who is directly responsible for law making?

However, through delegated legislation unelected Government Ministers and civil servants (members of the executive branch) are directly responsible for law making.

9. What does delegated legislation erode?

Another problem is that Parliamentary supremacy is eroded.

10. What is Parliament’s theoretical role?

In theory Parliament is the supreme law maker but in practice it actually debates and passes less than 1% of all laws.

11. How many Acts were passed in 2016 compared to statutory instruments?

For example in 2016 there were 25 Acts of Parliament passed compared to over 2,000 Statutory Instruments.

12. What does the volume of statutory instruments contradict?

This seems a complete contradiction of the responsibility of Parliament.