I’m not talking about replacing the American separation-of-powers system with a parliamentary system (executive branch elected by legislature). I mean in matters of form, procedure and decorum. In the Westminster Parliament, everybody who speaks gets heckled by the opposition. Often very loudly. And the PM has to face “question time” periodically. It’s all much more raucous and lively than either house of Congress, and existing rules would never permit such things. Perhaps that should be changed? Would it lead to better, more honest government in the U.S.?
What you’re perceiving as normal Commons procedure is probably Prime Minister’s Questions, plus a few other major speeches, and the odd budget report. All of these attract a full house and get deserving receptions (600 people in a small place, and the Commons is small, make a lot of noise!)
Most of the work of the House of Commons is far less interesting, and often only a few dozen MPs will be present. Many will be absent for all sorts of reasons, from ‘fact-finding missions’ to the Seychelles, through committee meetings (MPs have to be part of all sorts of other parts of the bureaucracy as well as being in the Commons), through to genuine responsibilities such as their ‘surgery’ - where their constituents (even the PM has a duty to represent 60,000 Durham folk) can meet their representative and raise their concerns.
But ignoring such waffle…PMQ is an exception, and mostly the Prime Minister acts with impunity. For the obvious example (which I do not intend as a political one but as an example of the power of the majority party) he never had a clear majority supporting action against Iraq without a mandate, but did so.
I don’t know much of anything about the British system of government, besides what you’ve told me. But what I’m getting is this: Instead of saying “While I respect the concerns of the gentleman from Minnesota, I must gently disagree, in light of the data gathered by my committee…” the arguments would be much more straightforward, like “Are you crazy? That’s preposterous! I can’t believe you’d suggest such a thing!”
Am I understanding you correctly at all?
That sounds like it would have some pros and cons. Things might get done a lot faster, I suppose.
I’d like to see a vote of no confidence bring new elections.
The 4 year term just makes for expensive elections as all donors try to get 4 years worth of privileges. If they had to pony up for an unknown span, a lot of them might sit one out.
I’d also like to see a roll for third parties. Everyone who voted for Perot or Nader should get someone on their side in the chamber.
Interesting ideas, but we’re not talking about those kinds of basic constitutional changes.
Regarding hecling, just for fun, I randomly looked at a debate in Hansard (this debate was about NHS funding problems in Shropshire). Obviously, I’m not going to post the entire debate, but here are some lines, in this case, the first lines spoken the debates by various members responding to each other (I’ve put the party affiliation of the member speaking before the quote, so you can see who each MP is addressing. If you look below, you’ll see that nobody is exactly being fed to the lions, and I have the feeling that, except for Ministers Questions, most conversations in the House are like this:
Conservative: "I am extremely grateful for this opportunity to the draw hon. Members’ attention to the crisis that is currently engulfing the NHS in Shropshire and I am pleased that hon. Members from all parties are hoping to participate. "
Conservative: "On my hon. Friend’s last point, one of my constituents, Mr. Frank Jones, cast the deciding vote to merge the two hospitals. "
Conservative: “I am grateful to my hon. Friend for confirming the historic state of affairs”
Labour:" I opposed the merger at the time that it took place, but I recall a debate in the House when the then Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health, the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, the hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr. Lammy), made it clear in response to my question that no deal was on the table to wipe off the historic debt."
Conservative: " I am grateful for clarification of the debate in the House. From my understanding, it still stands that, in the penultimate draft of the merger agreement, the debt position was due to have been assumed by the Government. "
Conservative: " My hon. Friend is generous to give way to so many hon. Members"
Conservative: “I am sure that we shall be getting into the implications of the reductions during the debate”
Lib-Dem: “I agree with the hon. Gentleman’s accurate and erudite analysis of what has gone wrong.”
Conservative: “I am very pleased to see that the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) has joined this debate, because a number of his constituents use the services of Shropshire hospitals.”
Conservative: “I wrote to the Secretary of State for Health about the issue of the chief executive with the fake CV.”
Conservative: “I am grateful to my hon. Friend not only for taking the initiative and posing those questions, but for raising the question of where responsibility lies for management of the NHS.”
Lib-Dem: “That is the reason why I am present in this debate. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that we depend on the Royal Shrewsbury hospital more than on any other for our accident and emergency care and substantial services.”
Conservative: “I agree completely with the hon. Gentleman.”
Conservative: " have been following my hon. Friend’s argument closely and—before he moves on to the ambulance service—he quoted the expected saving from the threatened closure of the three cottage hospitals in his constituency as £1.6 million."
Conservative: “My hon. Friend makes a characteristically strong point.”
And it goes on. It’s not exactly very rowdy. The Chair has to scold the House once, and that’s only to ask that those members who are leaving not be too loud.
Short answer to the OP: Yes! The President should have to sit in Congress and get grilled by our congressmen. Make him accountable, I say.
Adam
That would be nothing like the House of Commons then, would it? The equivalent of the President is the Queen, who doesn’t get “Grilled” in the House. Tony Blair is in some respects more like Dennis Hastert than he is like the President. It’s not a perfect comparison, but he is the head of government, not the head of state.
Uh, the Queen is not the commander in chief. She doesn’t control any executive agencies. Not really a good comparision.
Frankly, I think both parties would benefit from either banning applause until the end, or allowing serious questioning. The applause is one of those things that not only is pathetically staged and stupid, but everyone KNOWS its staged and stupid, and yet somehow we all play pretend and do it anyway. The worst thing about it is that it’s BORING. Half the time any President has to address the nation is taken up by pretty much 100% syncophantic or pointless clapping.
The President used to just send a report over and didn’t even appear in person, I’m not sure that’s not a better idea than what we do now.
The British posters here should probably know that in America we tend to see the House of Commons only very rarel on C-SPAN, and when it gets shown here it’s generally when theres a huge row and the MPs are acting like madmen.
We’re talking about the daily business of Congress, not the SOTU address.
The President is already accountable to Congress in a variety of ways. Congress has the power to impeach, they’re in control of the budget, and of course the President is required to make a State of the Union Address yearly.
Marc
Of course, things can get out of hand sometimes.
Have there ever been any physical attacks in the British parliament?
I’ve haven’t seen question time all that often (and have seen it in the Canadian Parliament a few times too) but I have enjoyed what I did see. I’m impressed that the PM and ministers can think on their feet.
Given our Congress, I’m all for it - if only because it would keep the Daily Show in clips for centuries. Seriously, my impression is that the PM must really understand the issues, and not just speak from a briefing book.
Stop, you’re giving me an American-civic-frustration hard-on! 
There have been physical attacks, but they’re not common. In fact, in May of 2004, Tony Blair got hit with powder thrown at him by protestors.
He’s not required to make the address annually or in person, at least by the constitution. It’s possible the annual thing is due to some federal law. And in person is at the choice of the President, for many years they didn’t do it in person, Jefferson was the first President to not make the speech in person because he thought it smacked of monarchism. That tradition continued all the way until Wilson. I believe.
I submitted too soon. There was a famous case during the time leading up to the English Civil War of a physical attack by a member on another. In 1629, Parliament censured Charles I, and the king ordered it dissolved. So, in obedience to the King, the Speaker of the House dissolved Parliament and attempted to leave. An MP, Denzil Hollis, cried out “God’s Wounds! You shall sit here until we please to rise!”, and along with another MP, held the Speaker down in his chair while somebody read a proclamation condemning Catholicism and illegal taxes.
… he wouldn’t last a minute. Prime Minister’s Question Time requires that someone be extremely articulate. It does tend to place limitations on who can hold the job.
The PM is merely first among equals, so he comes in for all kinds of guff. The US Presidency is more “royal” and has been getting progressively more so the entire time it has been in existence. Like the Queen, he is the Head of State and so gets a lot of special privileges.