The newest edition of Erskine May: Parliamentary Practice has been made available online free for the first time in its almost 200-year history. The 25th edition, which saw the light of day this May, is now accessible and searchable on the British Parliament’s website. Earlier, one could only buy it in print for quite a considerable price. A recent edition, for example, was sold for £329.99 ($415).
Speaker of the House John Bercow welcomed the move, saying that “All too often Parliamentary rules are seen as a Byzantine mystery, only understood by a select few”.
“Therefore I am delighted that Erskine May, the venerable Bible of Parliamentary procedures, is to be made freely available to all, to help people develop a wider understanding of how their elected representatives work”, he noted.
Clerk of the House of Commons John Benger, who is in charge of the parliamentary procedures, noted that the timing of the development could not have been better.
"The digital version will maintain the iconic status of Erskine May whilst opening up parliamentary practice to a wider audience, something that is all the more important at this time of such great constitutional and procedural turbulence”, he told the BBC apparently referencing the Brexit chaos which the UK has been trying to tame over recent month.
Erskine May, first published in 1844 and named after its creator, who was Clerk of the House then, describes parliamentary procedures and political customs and is regarded as part of the non-codified UK Constitution. The changes to the previous 2011 version, fixed by the recent edition of Erskine May, include the Brexit-related developments to UK law, the right of British citizens to raise topics for debates in Parliament with online petitions as well as conditions for calling early general elections or a constituency’s right to recall an MP for misconduct.
