Great discussion of (among many other things) written parliamentary questions and the considerable increase in their use in the very recent past, in this podcast.

Find out more and apply Deadline: Thursday 7 May 2026

📣 Applications are open for the Summer School of the Standing Group on Parliaments!

🗓️ 27 Jul–6 Aug, Goethe University Frankfurt

@sgparliaments.bsky.social proudly presents its Summer School which offers a platform to:
✔️ Explore recent advancements
✔️ Present research
✔️ Receive career advice

⌛️7 May

Fantastic!

NEW PAPER ALERT! My paper, with @bjornhoyland.bsky.social , on how “policy loss” shapes support for the EU has just been published in @cpsjournal.bsky.social. Check it out!
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📣 We are very excited for this year’s @psa-parliaments.bsky.social annual conference taking place at the University of York!

📝 More details and registration:

psaparliaments.org/annual-confe...

Does anyone in the UK Parliament or legislative studies world know what is happening with The Public Whip website? It doesn't seem to have been updated with new divisions since May. #thepublicwhip #ukparliament www.publicwhip.org.uk

Marco Giugni & Maria Grasso review literature on political participation in a new review article for @govandopp.bsky.social. They argue for the benefits of linking work in this area from political science, (political) sociology and social movement studies: tinyurl.com/cbe34v3w.

In a new review article for @govandopp.bsky.social, Dr Aline Sierp assesses the nature of research in memory studies over the last 25 years: tinyurl.com/u46bm7sc.

🚨 Internship alert! 🚨

Are you an ECN member currently studying your PhD? Don’t miss out on this fantastic career development opportunity to work at the House of Commons! 🙌🏻

🗓️ Apply by 28 September 2025
More details below ⬇️

I managed to see the outside of the Maltese Parliament while on holiday last week. #parliaments #stv

Looking forward to presenting research with @philiplynch.bsky.social on votes in select committees at #sgop25 in Barcelona tomorrow.

Great evening. Thanks for arranging this!

Panel at the launch of the book Exploring Parliament, hosted by the Institute for Government - from left to right: Chloe Mawson (House of Lords, Clerk Assistant), Dr Sean Haughey (Liverpool University), Dr Hannah White (Institute for Government) and Professor Meg Russell (Constitution Unit, UCL).

Panel at the launch of the book Exploring Parliament, hosted by the Institute for Government - from left to right: Margaret McKinnon (House of Commons, Director, People and Culture Team), Professor Nick Allen (Royal Holloway University), Dr Hannah White (Institute for Government) and Dr Rebecca McKee (Institute for Government).

Students attending the launch of the book Exploring Parliament, hosted by the Institute for Government - from left to right: Emily Carter, Isabella Elie, Professor Cristina Leston-Bandeira, Lewis Rantell, Soleen Ali and Dr Alexandra Meakin.

Guests enjoying the launch of the book Exploring Parliament, hosted by the Institute for Government.

We had the most brilliant launch of Exploring Parliament this evening at the Institute for Government! Thank you to all the panellists, all the guests, and most of all to @instituteforgovernment.org.uk for hosting us, truly appreciated 🙏😊. V special also to have our own students attending 😊1/2:

Many congratulations to you both!

Kicking us off with his and @philiplynch.bsky.social‘s
very recent work on committee divisions in the House of Commons is @rickwhitaker.bsky.social

Heading to Birmingham for #PSA25 to present some research conducted with @philiplynch.bsky.social on select committee divisions in the House of Commons.

Thanks David!

A Representative European Parliament? Members of European Parliamentary Party Groups and the Representation of Citizens' Preferences The link between citizens' and representatives' preferences is central to representative democracy. Research on representation of citizens' preferences in the European Parliament (EP) has primarily c....

Apologies, link to article contained an error. Here is the correct link: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Over time, centrist party MEPs have become
more pro-EU compared to their groups’ voters.

Graphs showing median voters and MEPs by party group at four time points.

Looking at median MEP and voter positions by party group at 4 time points shows they are closer in more cases on left-right than on EU integration dimension. Most EP groups’ voters are more clustered around the middle of the EU integration scale than are their groups’ MEPs.

Graph showing positions of median MEPs and voters in 1999, 2004, 2009 and 2014.

We find that the median voter tends to be more Eurosceptic than the median MEP.

In a new article in @jcms-eu.bsky.social with @kgattermann.bsky.social & @sofiavasilopoulou.bsky.social we look at how close MEPs are to their voters on the left-right and EU integration scales using MEP survey data & European Election Study data onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... A brief🧵.

A new edition of Exploring Parliament is out! It includes a chapter by Lucinda Maer and me on how the UK Parliament went about scrutinising government during Brexit and the Covid pandemic.

Publication day! The 2nd edition of Exploring Parliament is out. Thank you to the 73 authors who brought academic and parliamentary practice expertise to the book; special thanks to my fab co-editors @ameakin.bsky.social
and @louisevthompson.bsky.social 😊👇:

We have reached 200 institutions in 34 countries from whom researchers have requested our MEP survey data, collected by @simonhix.bsky.social, @davidfarrell-ucd.bsky.social, @rogerawanscully.bsky.social, Galina Zapryanova and me! You can find out more about the data here mepsurvey.eu/users-of-the...

On my way home from Edinburgh after giving evidence to the @scotparl.bsky.social Delegated Powers committee’s inquiry on framework legislation and Henry VIII powers. Thanks to the committee and panel for a fascinating discussion. Written evidence here: yourviews.parliament.scot/dplr/framewo....

Should you be so inclined, you can find out my preferences for the order in which jam and cream should be added to a scone and various other more parliamentary-type things, via the PSA Parliament group's website here psaparliaments.org/urgent_quest....

I hope you weren't rudely awoken by the dustmen.

Private Members' Bills This briefing describes the stages a bill goes through when it is introduced to the House of Commons as a private member's bill.

In light of the today's agenda in the House of Commons, you can read about the legislative process for private members' bills in this House of Commons Library Briefing commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-bri....

@rickwhitaker.bsky.social (University of Leicester) presents his commissioned research on what skeleton bills are, why they are used in the UK Parliament, Senedd & Scottish Parliament, and what the implications of delegated powers are

You can read more about it here: blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...