Hi, there.
Welcome back to the step-by-step guide on
how to write an A Level Law essay.
If you haven’t seen my first video on Statutory
Interpretation, I would recommend that you
do so as it is an introductory video to my
channel and how my video guides work.
Before we begin, please note that this video
guide will be most effective for you if you
already have some basic knowledge of the relevant
chapters that I will be discussing.
In addition to that I will not go through
every single detail of the content of the
essay in the first video as it is meant to
be a quick tutorial.
As this is Part One of the video, detailed
explanation and discussion of the contents
of the essay will only be done in Part Two
of this video guide where I will go through
the essay with you in detail.
If you find this video guide useful, please
like, share and subscribe to my channel and
don’t forget to click on the bell button
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be making video guides every week.
With that said, let’s get started with Part
One of video guide #3.
The question of the day reads: Consider how
delegated legislation has played an important
role in the development of the law and critically
assess the possibility of the practice also
being a threat to democratic law-making in
Parliament.
To answer an examination question we must
first take note of two things.
Which chapter is the question covering, and
what is the focus of the question.
By first considering these two aspects of
the question we will know how to address the
question appropriately.
From the question we can infer that this question
covers the chapter Delegated Legislation
And the focus of the question concerns the
importance of DL and the possibility of it
being a threat to democratic law-making.
As per usual, a complete essay needs to be
structured properly.
Therefore, our essay should include an introduction,
relevant points, and finally a good conclusion
which addresses the question.
Introduction
Before we address the question on delegated
legislation, we should first briefly define
laws and sources of laws, especially written
sources of laws made by Parliament as Acts
of Parliament.
The reason for a quick introduction on sources
of laws and Parliament is because delegated
legislation is very much a part of what written
sources of laws are.
After that we should briefly define delegated
legislation and mention its relation to Parliament.
It should be noted that this is only a quick
preview of the more detailed explanation that
is to come once we go into the contents of
the answer, therefore a very brief mention
as to its relation to Parliament will suffice.
For the thesis statement.
In order to determine if delegated legislation
threatens democracy, we should first discuss
the workings of delegated legislation and
its regulation.
As law-making and democracy are very controversial
things, it is best that we develop our answer
properly by going through the workings and
its purposes before we can actually make an
informed decision on whether or not delegated
legislation threatens democracy.
This is a very good type of essay where we
can flex our knowledge and opinions on constitutional
and civic matters with critical thoughts about
the subject.
Point One
As an extension to what has been teased in
the introduction regarding delegated legislation’s
relation with Parliament, we can now discuss
the workings of delegated legislation by highlighting
the concept of an enabling Act.
Delegated legislation is derived from its
parent Act, or enabling Act which proscribes
its parameters and procedures for law-making.
It can generally be seen as a canvas for which
detailed laws can be inscribed upon by the
people who have been delegated the power by
Parliament to make in Parliament’s stead.
Of the many forms of delegated legislation,
at least the three main types of delegated
legislation should be highlighted with its
workings and methods for law-making briefly
illustrated and explained.
These are Orders in the Council made by the
Queen and the Privy Council, Statutory Instruments
made by government ministers and government
departments, and By-laws made by local authorities
and public corporations.
After that we can briefly explain some of
the reasons for the need for Delegated Legislation
and highlight some of the good points of Delegated
Legislation in the whole law-making process.
The discussion of some of the most important
reasons should be directed at addressing the
question on how Delegated Legislation plays
an important role in the development of the
law.
An example to highlight can be the fact that
Delegated Legislation allows people or bodies
of people with more specific skills, knowledge
and responsibilities to make or change laws
for specific purposes, especially in an emergency
situations.
Point Two
Because the question concerns with how Delegated
Legislation may have threatened democracy,
we should now briefly introduce the fact that
there are controls for which to regulate it.
In this point we are actually still discussing
about the workings of Delegated Legislation
and so we should not properly address the
issue with how it threatens democracy yet.
This should be done after the facts about
the controls are considered.
Explain Parliamentary controls in detail by
going through some of the methods for which
it uses to regulate DL.
Other than the enabling Act, we should also
briefly discuss about the other ways in which
Parliament can actually regulate Delegated
Legislation.
This would include the Scrutiny Committees,
Affirmative Resolution, and Negative Resolution.
Explain Judicial controls in detail by going
through some of the methods for which it uses
to regulate DL.
The emphasis here should be on the explanation
of how judicial review works and the concept
of ultra vires with some case examples to
illustrate its regulation on abuse of power
or powers that were not executed according
to procedures.
Point Three
Re-evaluate the workings of Delegated Legislation
and the controls available to regulate law-making
by way of Delegated Legislation.
We will now have to bring together everything
that we have discussed about the workings
of Delegated Legislation and consider if,
overall, it has threaten the concept of democratic
law-making.
A brief introduction and discussion on democracy
and democratic law-making should also be done.
This is to highlight the importance of democracy
and how the development of laws should be
influenced by the masses rather than an individual
who possibly is not even democratically elected
to do the job of law-making.
The highlight of this point is important before
we can critically evaluate the question on
Delegated Legislation’s threat to democracy.
With that in mind, we can now link the discussion
back to the focus of the question.
To do this, it is important to include our
own views, comments and opinions on whether
or not Delegated Legislation actually threatens
democracy.
One of the things that candidates can highlight
is the criticism that Delegated Legislation
has taken law-making away from the democratically
elected and allows non-elected people such
as political appointees from certain government
departments to make laws.
This can be made worse if sub-delegation is
also practiced within that department.
However, this can be contrasted by highlighting
the basic aspect of Parliamentary control
over Delegated Legislation.
For example, Parliament has the final say
on what becomes law by way of an Affirmative
Resolution.
Conclusion
To conclude, we should briefly summarise what
we have discussed throughout the essay.
The summary should briefly highlight some
of the most important points of the essay
which addresses the question properly.
Lastly, we should address the question by
stating our stand on whether or not Delegated
Legislation actually threatens democracy by
briefly highlighting some of the most important
points to support our view.
After much critical thought and discussion,
a conclusion can be made and must coincide
with our general view throughout the discussion.
Before I end the video, let us just review
the whole answer one more time so that we
can prepare ourselves to write the full essay.
Since the question concerns the importance
of Delegated Legislation and the possibility
of it being a threat to democratic law-making,
we have endeavoured to introduce our approach
to the essay by stating that we will develop
our essay by first going through the definition
and the workings of Delegated Legislation
and its types where we have also stressed
its importance in the process of law-making.
After that we have explained how the making
of laws by way of Delegated Legislation is
also regulated by both Parliament and the
Judiciary.
Finally, to address the second part of the
question, we have endeavoured to re-evaluate
the practice of Delegated Legislation and
related it to the question on whether or not
it is a threat to democracy by first highlighting
the importance of democracy and democratic
law-making.
That is the end of the video guide.
I hope it has helped you in your legal studies.
Do check out part two of this video where
I’ll go through with you the full essay
answer of this question.
I will link the video in the description below.
If you have any questions, comments or any
suggestions on what other topics you would
like me to cover, please leave a comment on
this video.
And again, if you find this video guide useful,
please like, share and subscribe to my channel
as I will be uploading new video guides on
different topics every week.
Thank you.
