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Twenty-fifth Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference
21
Many parliamentarians faced the problem of how best to serve their parliaments and people despite the sheer volume of work, which made them busier and lessened their fluence on actual legislation, thus increasing Executive power. Ways of stopping or slowing wn the process might include non-elected appointees in Cabinets-strongly opposed by some; much more work in select committees; and the administration of Ministers' departments by Under-Secretaries.
Methods of selecting Prime Ministers, Ministers, and the representation of a Speaker's electorate were also preoccupations of the "older" Commonwealth members. They were reminded also of their responsibility to Parliament for good laws. It was felt that a time might come when the incumbent member had so much advantage with unlimited stationery, staff, and free mail that the democratic process itself was denied.
The MPs of newer and/or smaller nations had some different concerns. In Papua New Guinea, MPs had no telephones or offices in their electorates so they asked the Government to give them 1 or even 2 months' notice of major Bills, then returned to their electorates to find out which way their people wanted them to vote. Malawi MPs had formerly had no offices either, but had overcome the difficulty by fund raising and by their own efforts- including making their own bricks.
The representative of Himachal Pradesh wondered whether there should be a minimum qualification for MPs, bearing in mind the complexities of the modern world. Qualifications were required, after all, for lowly clerks, and knighthoods were dependent on merit.
Zambia reminded delegates that although it was unicameral and a one-party State, the traditional parliamentary spirit had not died-Government Bills had been thrown out when the back bench was not satisfied. The meeting did not feel it could respond to the appeal from Sri Lanka for a uniform system of administration for countries with democratic governments—"Never confuse equality with conformity", said a New Zealand delegate.
The Singaporean delegate thought that politics should be concerned with humanity rather than with the appropriation of power, and the Barbados representative underlined a point made variously by several other speakers when he said that in his view the most important point for MPs to remember was that immediately they were elected they became the servant of the people, not their master.