Delegated Legislation

Delegated Legislation （授权立法，行政法规，政府法令）

Parliament is too busy to pass every law which affects people in ordinary day to day living. So, it sometimes delegates (委托) powers to inferior(下级) bodies e.g. Ministers of the Government, Local Authorities etc. to make rules, regulations, orders and bye-laws. Rules, regulations, and bye-laws made by such inferior bodies are called delegated legislation or subordinate legislation.

Delegated legislation includes statutory instruments made by Government ministers, bye-laws made by local authorities and Orders in Council made by the Queen in Privy Council under emergency powers.

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Control of delegated legislation

There are three types of control – judicial control (by the courts) and Parliamentary control (by Parliament itself), and Human Rights Act 1998.

l Judicial control (司法管制)
The courts have power to declare any rule made by delegated legislation ultra vires (超越权限) and void – this happens if the inferior body exceeds the powers conferred by (授予) Parliament. This is sometimes called Judicial Review (司法复审).

l Parliamentary control
Some statutory instruments do not come into force until approved by affirmative(肯定的) resolution(正式决定) of Parliament. In addition many other statutory instruments must be laid before Parliament for forty days before they come into force. During that period, Members may pass a resolution to veto (否决) the instrument.

l Human Rights Act (1998)
UK Courts now have power to declare delegated legislation void if any such legislation breaches the above Act.

Advantages and disadvantages of Delegated legislation:

Advantages:
1. Time saving;
2. Quiker than parliamentary legislation;
3. Deals well with questions of detail and technical matters;
4. Easy to amend or withdraw (撤回)

Disadvantage:
1. Loss of parliamentary control;
2. Insufficient publicity;
3. Not always fully thought out;
4. Can lead to excessive legislation