Odd legislative procedures
Every now and again I’ll take myself on a tour through some random Wikipedia entries and learn something new and, hopefully, odd.
Today, through a trail I couldn’t begin to recreate, I learned about a cool (but, sadly, recently discontinued) practice practise in the British Parliament.
Parliament’s sessions are open to the public, but a member can request that the debate be done in private. (Apparently this has only happened twice in recent years.) He does this by calling out, “I spy strangers!” which immediately leads to a vote of whether to close the proceedings to the public.
Sadly, in 1998 the Modernisation Committee changed the procedure, so now a member simply makes a motion “that the House sit in private.” Borrrrrrrring.
A member of Parliament suddenly standing and shouting ”I spy strangers!” — now that’s the way government ought to work.
