Government e-petition website will go live on Thursday and will show petitions that have been accepted for debate in Commons
The Commons Speaker, John Bercow, has emerged as a strong supporter of government plans to allow electronic petitions as a way of shaping the parliamentary agenda and increasing public engagement.
A government e-petition website will go live on Thursday, showing petitions that have been accepted for consideration for debate in the Commons.
The leader of the house, Sir George Young, has said petitions that garner more than 100,000 signatures should warrant consideration for debate.
Bercow is supporting the move, privately complaining the current written petition system is little understood and appreciated. Once received, written petitions, he points out, are put in a plastic bag behind the Speaker's chair – a fate he claims speaks volumes about the seriousness with which petitions are taken.
Bercow is understood to be flexible about how parliament should be seen to be responding to an e-petition garnering big support. He does not necessarily think every issue should be considered at a full- length debate, but might simply require a minister to come to the house and answer a question on the issue. The e-petition page on the government's Directgov website will show the e-petitions that have been accepted so far.
It is widely expected that supporters of capital punishment, immigration controls, withdrawal from Europe and opposition to green taxes will initially dominate. An e-petition will only be allowed to stay on the website for a year, and duplicates will not be allowed.
The system replaces a previous system set up by Tony Blair's aides on the Downing Street website, which was suspended before the 2010 general election.
There was no requirement for Downing Street to do anything formal in response to an e-petition.
The libertarian website Guido Fawkes is already promoting a vote on capital punishment with a petition, saying: "We petition the government to review all treaties and international commitments which may inhibit the ability of parliament to restore capital punishment.
"Following this review, the Ministry of Justice should map out the necessary legislative steps which will be required to restore the death penalty for the murder of children and police officers when killed in the line of duty.
"The findings of the review and the necessary substantive legislation [should] be presented to House of Commons for debate no later than 12 months after this petition passes the acceptance threshold."
The government has said departments can reject petitions if there is already an e-petition on the same issue or if it contains confidential, libellous, false or defamatory statements; offensive, joke or nonsense content; or if the issue is not the responsibility of the government, or is about honours or appointments
An e-petition will also be rejected "if it not does include a request for action".
Anyone signing an e-petition will be required to provide their email address to prevent duplications.
An e-petition with more than 100 signatories will be passed to the backbench business committee to decide if the issue warrants debate.
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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/aug/02/speaker-backs-e-petition-website
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