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A selection of recent publications relating to parliamentary studies prepared with the assistance of the Library of Parliament (October 2025 – December 2025).

 “Maturity Framework for AI in Parliaments.” Inter-Parliamentary Union – Geneva. A toolkit for parliamentarians: 38p, 2025.

• The Maturity Framework for AI in Parliaments has been developed to help parliaments adopt AI – and Generative AI (GenAI) tools in particular – with confidence and control, supporting them in connecting and managing a diverse range of complex projects. It is also intended to be used as a tool for communicating AI readiness and strategy across senior management.

“Welcoming new parliamentarians – Good practices for onboarding and offboarding MPs.” Inter-Parliamentary Union – Geneva. A toolkit for parliamentarians: 36p, 2025.

• Moving into parliamentary life is a pivotal moment for any MP. The way in which institutions prepare, welcome and support their new members can have a lasting impact on parliamentarians’ experience. For parliamentary administrations, the onboarding process is not just about guiding new members through the mechanics of parliamentary procedure. It is also about fostering relationships, building capacity and creating an environment in which parliamentarians can thrive from the very beginning of their term.

Brown, Ian. “Indigenous Laws: A Novel Form of Legislation in Canada (A Drafter’s Perspective).” Journal of Parliamentary and Political Law 19 (3): 529,

October 2025.

• An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families (the FNIM Act) has affirmed the right of Indigenous peoples, that is First Nations, Inuit and Métis, to enact laws respecting child and family services. It further provides that those Indigenous laws will prevail in the case of any conflict with a law enacted by the Parliament or Government of Canada or by a province. Legislative work enabled by the FNIM Act has started. As of January 24, 2025, 14 Indigenous laws have come into force and 69 notices of intent to legislate have been received by the Government of Canada…This paper is based on the author’s experience in working on a legislation project for a First Nation and on the issues encountered.

Davidson, Alistair. “Uncertainty and the Exercise of Reserve Powers: Revisiting a Governor-General’s Code of Practice.” Australasian Parliamentary Review 40 (2): 13-32, Spring/Summer 2025.

• This article examines the concept of uncertainty as it accompanies the exercise of the Governor-General’s reserve powers according to unwritten constitutional conventions. While such conventions offer flexibility in constitutional umpiring, their vagueness contributes to controversy, speculation and even crisis. During episodes of acute parliamentary dispute, uncertainty has the potential to undermine the Governor- General’s reputation and authority. In response, Canadian scholar Bruce Hicks has advocated for an apolitical decision-making rule for Canada’s Governor-General. The rule aims to foster greater predictability by enhancing expectation that Parliament will strive to resolve its own constitutional disputes. Building on Hicks’s proposal, this article suggests Australia should go further and introduce a Governor-General’s Code of Practice, an idea Australia’s Constitutional Commission considered in the 1980s. The proposed code would outline guiding principles for use of reserve powers, including Hicks’s rule, to buttress trust in Australia’s federal parliamentary democracy.

Dubrow, Geoff. “Reinvigorating Public Accounts Committees – Strengthening Accountability Across the Commonwealth.” The Parliamentarian – Journal of the Parliaments of the Commonwealth 106 (3): 28-30, 2025.

• This article draws from lessons learned to highlight five key challenges and offers a call to action for Parliaments and stakeholders to reinvigorate PACs as a vehicle for meaningful accountability.

Feldman, Charlie. “Notwithstanding the Backbench: Section 33 in Non-Government Bills.” Constitutional Forum constitutionnel 34 (2): 81-93, 2025.

• This article will not address the mechanics of notwithstanding clause, the arguments for and against its use, or how courts should approach its invocation — all of this has received extensive academic attention. Rather, the purpose of this article is to fill a narrow gap in the literature regarding the history of federal non-government bills introduced with a notwithstanding clause based on publicly available information. It will do so in three parts: first, it will briefly present some relevant parliamentary vocabulary and concepts; second, it will review the individual bills at issue, sorted by theme; and finally, it will conclude with brief comments and directions for future research.

Feldman, Charlie and Nag, Anushua. “Senate Public Bills in Canada: What goes up must bring something down?” Australian Parliamentary Review 40 (2): 91-105,

Spring/Summer 2025.

• This article examines the evolving role of Senate Public Bills (SPBs) in Canada following reforms to the Senate appointment process. It documents a sharp rise in the introduction and enactment of SPBs, analyses the procedural implications of this trend, and explores its impacts on both the Senate and the House of Commons. Drawing on legislative data and committee activity, the authors assess whether the Senate’s growing self-initiated legislative workload enhances its ability to serve Canadians or inadvertently displaces other parliamentary functions. The article concludes by considering whether procedural reforms are needed to maintain institutional balance.

Franceschet, Susan and Rayment, Erica. “Parliamentarians’ perspectives on parenthood and politics in Canada’s House of Commons.” Parliamentary Affairs, Advance Access Publication: 1-21, August 2025.

• Canada’s members of parliament (MPs) work long hours, travel frequently, and spend weeks away from home each year. Research on gender and politics finds that parliamentary work is not designed to accommodate those with caring obligations, usually women. In this paper, we leverage a survey of sitting Canadian MPs conducted in 2022 to assess whether women MPs report greater difficulty combining a political career with family life and to identify patterns of MP support for parenthood accommodations in parliament. Drawing on responses to closed- and open-ended questions, we argue that women MPs experience the challenge of reconciling work and family more acutely than do men MPs. When it comes to support for family-friendly policies in parliament, however, we find that party is more strongly correlated with MPs’ attitudes than gender. Most respondents are supportive of accommodating parenthood, but resistance appears among Conservative MPs, particularly for accommodations affecting core parliamentary operations.

Glynn, Patrick. “‘We Asked, You Said, We Did’: Closing the Feedback Loop in Committees’ Public Engagement Processes.” Australasian Parliamentary Review 40 (2): 52-67, Spring/Summer 2025.

• Parliamentary departments are adopting more professionalised and embedded approaches to public engagement to address declining trust in democracy. A critical element of such engagement is ‘closing the feedback loop’. This involves returning to participants at the end of a process to explain how their contributions influenced outcomes (such as recommendations made by a committee), or to evaluate the impact of the engagement activity. Closing the feedback loop can help foster trust and legitimacy by assuring people they have been genuinely heard. However, many parliaments do not have clear strategies or consistent processes for feeding back to participants following an engagement initiative. This article argues that feedback loops are an indispensable component of effective parliamentary engagement. It considers the advantages (and associated risks) of implementing and closing feedback loops in public engagement with committee inquiries, presents three case studies, and concludes with practical strategies and considerations for embedding feedback into committee inquiries and other types of parliamentary business.

Sarauer, Nicole. “Living Legislative Work: The Experience of a Parliamentarian.” Journal of Parliamentary and Political Law, 19 (3) : 493, October 2025.

• The parliamentarian plays a fundamental role in the legislative process. It is the parliamentarian who takes a bill through its various stages. The considerations that influence the legislator’s work throughout this process, including bringing a bill to first reading, vary depending on the position that the legislator holds. Are they a member of the government or opposition? Are they a cabinet minister or a private member? Each role brings a multiplicity of different considerations.

Serban, Ruxandra. “Prime Minister’s Question Period in the Canadian House of Commons: Lessons in parliamentary reform.” The Constitution Unit: 7p, October 8, 2025.

• Between 2017 and 2025, the Canadian House of Commons operated a Prime Minister’s Question Period procedure, introduced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. In a new published article summarised here, the author explores how this procedure worked, and how it differed from the traditional Question Period model.

Serban, Ruxandra. “Questions to the Prime Minister in the Canadian House of Commons: Transformation or tweak?” Parliamentary Affairs, Advance Access Publication: 1-24, September 2025

• Parliamentary questions are important democratic accountability instruments, but little is known about how these procedures are reformed, and with what consequences. This paper uses the introduction of Prime Minister’s Question Period (PMQP) in the Canadian House of Commons in 2017 as a case study of questioning procedure reform. Under PMQP, the Prime Minister would answer all questions once a week, diverging from the traditional Question Period where the Prime Minister answered a few questions daily alongside ministers. As this is a way in which other parliaments have reformed questioning procedures, the case has wider comparative relevance. Using quantitative analysis of prime ministerial attendance and questions, as well as interviews, this paper explores the effects of the reform. Findings indicate that PMQP is similar to other individualized questioning procedures such as the UK’s Prime Minister’s Questions, but retains features of Question Period such as party control, and a confrontational style.