A DISAPPEARING ACT
Introduction
The power to enact, amend and repeal rules of law which are binding on the people and organs of state of a country is the most important work done by Parliament. It is seen to be the chief law-making arm of the state and this power is assigned to it by the South African Constitution. Its representatives are elected by the people and thus, through this simple structure, in a properly functioning democracy it is the people, through Parliament, who define the nature of the state.
In 2005, South Africa’s Parliament tabled its new vision and strategic plan for 2004-2009.
Parliament’s core objectives were defined in this document with its number one core objective being to pass laws. And, on face value, it seems to be living up to this task - between 1994 and 2006 Parliament passed a total of 936 laws.
While this seems to be an impressive total, when looking at a breakdown of the legislation passed year-on-year a clear trend emerges: the number of bills passed each year has, on the whole, decreased since 1994.
Here are the hard numbers:
•1994: 57 (Number of bills introduced) (52) (Number of bills passed) - 91.2 % (Percentage passed)
•1995: 108 (89) - 82.4 %
•1996: 108 (108) - 100.0 %
•1997: 116 (108) - 93.1 %
•1998: 142 (137) - 96.5 %
•1999: 66 (60) - 90.9 %
•2000: 70 (70) - 100.0 %
•2001: 85 (69) - 81.2 %
•2002: 70 (75) - 107.5 %
•2003: 74 (61) - 82.4 %
•2004: 25 (40) - 137.5 %
•2005: 42 (39) - 92.9 %
•2006: 35 (28) - 80.0 %
The numbers make for interesting reading. It immediately becomes apparent that, in its first few years, Parliament was under massive pressure to amend the bulk of apartheid legislation. The number of bills introduced from 1995 to 1998, for example, does not drop below a hundred, peaking at 142 in 1998. Thereafter the number of bills introduced and passed has steadily declined. From 1999 to 2003 they stood at around 60 or 70 and, more recently – from 2004 to 2006 – they dropped further and South Africa’s Parliament currently deals with an average of just below 40 bills a year.
Significantly, the percentage of bills passed has never once dropped below 80%, sometimes even exceeding 100%, which further illustrates the amount of pressure Parliament was under in those early years: not only was it introducing a massive amount of new legislation, but it was passing the overwhelming majority.
That initial pressure has had consequences, however. A large amount of legislation has had to be amended by Parliament, for example – a sign that although the quantity of legislation passed was impressive, the same could not always be said about the quality.
But perhaps the most important point is this: last year Parliament passed the lowest percentage of bills introduced since 1994 – exactly 80% or 28 out of 35 bills. That might not seem like a lot but in practical terms it means one out of every five bills is not passed.
And, if one considers that in 1998 Parliament passed 137 bills – 102 more than it did last year – one has to ask why the percentage is so low because, if anything, Parliament certainly was not under anything near the sort of pressure it was in the late nineties.
Could it be, with the pressure off, Parliament has simply taken its foot off the pedal and is no longer driven
| Posted on 12/11/2007
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