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This Report considers the case for Parliament to be able to initiate and conduct inquiries into serious and significant matters of public concern. It takes up the recommendation made by our predecessor Committee (in the Government by Inquiry Report) that there should be a parliamentary mechanism for initiating inquiries. These would take the form of 'Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry', composed of parliamentarians and others. Recent calls for an inquiry into the Iraq war and its aftermath have made the issue very topical, and this Report uses the example of a possible Iraq inquiry to explore the considerations that would be involved in establishing a Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry.
In the Report, we examine the justification for creating Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry—in particular, that they would enable Parliament to hold the Executive to account more effectively (Chapter 2). We then look at some of the practical issues involved in setting up inquiries of this nature: how Parliament could instigate an inquiry, its composition, and its operation and powers (Chapter 3).
We conclude that it is crucial, in a constitutional sense, that Parliament has the necessary powers and abilities to scrutinise the Executive and hold it to account. Proper parliamentary scrutiny should include the ability to establish and undertake inquiries into significant matters of public concern. Parliament has, in the past, conducted investigations of this kind—and, as the great forum of the nation, should be expected to do so. Our recommendation for Parliamentary Commissions of Inquiry would promote effective parliamentary accountability by creating a process for Parliament to initiate inquiries where it—rather than the Executive—sees fit.
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