Parliamentary Questions, the Behaviour of Legislators, and the Function of Legislatures: An Introduction

The ability of parliamentarians to ask questions of members of the executive either in written form or on the floor of the chamber is a feature of many legislatures. Parliamentary questions often generate significant media attention and public interest. Despite the interest and importance, the nature and consequences of questioning in parliament remains obscure. As a working tool of parliamentarians, questions provide recorded data on individual members and the parliament as a collective institution. This paper suggests an analysis of parliamentary questions as a method for gaining better understanding of the preferences and behaviour of individual legislators and the role and function of modern-day parliaments. Keywords: parliamentary questionsmeasuring legislator behaviourconstituency orientationlegislative functionaccountability Acknowledgements The papers in this issue were original presentations at a conference on Parliamentary Questions, organised by Olivier Rozenberg and Shane Martin under the auspices of the ECPR Standing Group on Parliaments. We are grateful to Science Po and the French Sénat for their hospitality in hosting the event and to Professor Lord Norton of Louth for his support in bringing this issue to fruition. Notes A notable exception is the United States Congress which lacks the mechanism of questions, so familiar a part of parliamentary procedures in other countries. Congressional committees have the power to question witnesses, but no formal question time takes place on the floor of the House or Senate. Nor can Members of Congress table written questions. Indeed, the absence of PQs in American politics (both at the federal level but also as a tool at the level of state legislatures) is a likely reason for the lack of research on PQs, given the dominance and research-agenda-setting role of American scholarship in the study of legislatures. The rules governing the exact format of PQs vary greatly from parliament to parliament and tend to be codified in the parliament's Standing Orders and/or Rules of Procedure. The main differentiation tends to be among questions asked and answered orally in the chamber and questions tabled in written form (which tend to receive a written reply from the minister after associated civil servants have researched and drafted the answer). For example, in the British House of Commons, three types of PQs are common (Questions for Oral Answer in the Chamber with notice, Questions for Written Answer, and Urgent Questions in the Chamber [formerly Private Notice Questions]). Again, this finding is particularly counter-intuitive given the party-centred nature of the electoral system and the related lack of incentive to cultivate personal votes. A number of British television stations give live coverage of Prime Minister's Questions, and the 'performance' of the prime minister and leader of the opposition (who gets to ask more questions than any other individual member) encounters close scrutiny. Little wonder then, that some prime ministers, reportedly, spend considerable time studying likely topics on the day of Prime Minister's Questions. Further information and code guidelines are available at: http://comparativeagendas.org/ A strong committee system with the tools to inquire into ministerial and departmental action and Freedom of Information requests are two obvious tools which may complement or even replace the need for PQs.