Poll: Omnibus Bills

Welcome to the first poll on the blog. The topic for this one is Omnibus Bills, which are a type of bill that groups together a diverse number of subjects into a single legislative document. On one hand, they can speed up the passing of legislation tremendously and increase the chances of the measures contained being passed. On the other hand, the included measures could potentially be only loosely related, allow for controversial measures to be “bundled” into a take-it-or-leave-it package, and suppress discussion of individual parts of the bill.

The current debate in the House of Commons is over the Safe Streets and Communities Act, which groups together previous bills ranging from youth crime to sex offences to counter-terrorism and (until recently) police surveillance of internet activity. A precedent for this type of bill comes from the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1968-69, which covered issues such as divorce, birth control, homosexuality, gun control, gambling, and cruelty to animals.

So the question is…

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