By Tim Castle
LONDON (Reuters) - The ancient right to petition parliament could enter the online age after MPs seeking to boost democracy in the House of Commons said on Tuesday the public should be able to submit their pleas over the internet.
The Commons Reform Committee said plans to introduce "e-petitions" -- currently bogged down over grounds of costs -- should be dusted down and reconsidered.
At the moment petitions have to be presented by hand, despite the success of an electronic petition system on Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Downing Street website.
Only around 120 petitions were submitted in the last parliament, on issues such as Gaza, taxation and immigration, compared with a peak of 34,000 in 1843 shortly before rules were changed to bar Commons debate on a petition's merit.
The committee, established to help restore public confidence in parliament in the wake of the expenses scandal, said this constraint on debate should be lifted in a trial period next year to give petitions greater impact.
At present governments largely ignore petitions and the Commons takes little action in response to them.
The committee, formed in the wake of the damaging scandal over parliamentary expenses, said a fully costed plan for internet submission of petitions should be presented early in 2010.
The government, while supporting the e-petition scheme in principle, has said it is concerned about the estimated annual cost of 4 million pounds.
The right to petition the monarch over a grievance was recognised in the Magna Carta legal charter of 1215. It was restated in the Bill of Rights in 1689, which also made clear that parliament had the right to decide how to deal with petitions.
The committee also called for backbench (non-government) members to have more control over the setting of business in the Commons, which at present is largely dictated by the government.
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