Current membership

House of Lords

Lord Campbell of Alloway (Conservative)

Lord Dykes (Liberal Democrat)

Lord Gould of Brookwood (Labour)

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Labour)

Lord Kimball (Conservative)

Countess of Mar (Crossbench)

Lord Walpole (Crossbench)

House of Commons

David Maclean MP (Conservative, Penrith and The Border)

(Chairman)

Dr Roberta Blackman-Woods MP (Labour, City of Durham)

Mr Peter Bone MP (Conservative, Wellingborough)

Michael Jabez Foster MP (Labour, Hastings and Rye)

Mr David Kidney MP (Labour, Stafford)

Mr John MacDougall MP (Labour, Central Fife)

David Simpson MP (Democratic Unionist, Upper Bann)

Powers

The full constitution and powers of the Committee are set out in House of Commons Standing Order No. 151 and House of Lords Standing Order No. 74, available on the Internet via www.parliament.uk/jcsi.

Remit

The Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments (JCSI) is appointed to consider statutory instruments made in exercise of powers granted by Act of Parliament. Instruments not laid before Parliament are included within the Committee's remit; but local instruments and instruments made by devolved administrations are not considered by JCSI unless they are required to be laid before Parliament.

The role of the JCSI, whose membership is drawn from both Houses of Parliament, is to assess the technical qualities of each instrument that falls within its remit and to decide whether to draw the special attention of each House to any instrument on one or more of the following grounds:

i.  that it imposes, or sets the amount of, a charge on public revenue or that it requires payment for a licence, consent or service to be made to the Exchequer, a government department or a public or local authority, or sets the amount of the payment;

ii.  that its parent legislation says that it cannot be challenged in the courts;

iii.  that it appears to have retrospective effect without the express authority of the parent legislation;

iv.  that there appears to have been unjustifiable delay in publishing it or laying it before Parliament;

v.  that there appears to have been unjustifiable delay in sending a notification under the proviso to section 4(1) of the Statutory Instruments Act 1946, where the instrument has come into force before it has been laid;

vi.  that there appears to be doubt about whether there is power to make it or that it appears to make an unusual or unexpected use of the power to make;

vii.  that its form or meaning needs to be explained;

viii.  that its drafting appears to be defective;

ix.  or on any other ground which does not go to its merits or the policy behind it.

The Committee usually meets weekly when Parliament is sitting.

Publications

The reports of the Committee are published by The Stationery Office by Order of both Houses. All publications of the Committee are available on the Internet from www.parliament.uk/jcsi.

Committee staff

The current staff of the Committee are John Whatley (Commons Clerk), Kath Kavanagh (Lords Clerk) and Jacqueline Cooksey (Committee Secretary). Advisory Counsel: Peter Davis, Peter Brooksbank and Christine Cogger (Commons); Allan Roberts and Peter Milledge (Lords).

Contacts

All correspondence should be addressed to the Clerk of the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, Delegated Legislation Office, 7 Millbank, London SW1P 3JA. The telephone number for general inquiries is: 020 7219 2830; the Committee's e-mail address is: jcsi@parliament.uk.