Question time
A question time in a parliament occurs when members of the parliament ask questions of government ministers, which they are obliged to answer. It usually occurs daily while parliament is sitting, though it can be cancelled in exceptional circumstances. Question time originated in the Westminster system of the United Kingdom, and occurs in other countries, mostly Commonwealth countries, who use the system.
In practice, the questions asked in question time are often pre-arranged by the organisers of each party, although the questions are usually without notice. Questions from government backbenchers are either intended to allow the Minister to discuss the virtues of government policy, or to attack the opposition.
Westminster system
Australia
House Question Time, formally known as questions without notice, is an institution in the Commonwealth Parliament and in all state parliaments. It has been a daily feature of parliamentary activity for over 100 years. Question Time takes place on each sitting day and typically lasts from one hour to one hour and 30 minutes. Questions to government ministers normally alternate between government members and the opposition, with the opposition going first. Questions of ministers are generally asked by their counterpart shadow ministers in the opposition, and are always asked by backbenchers on the government side. In the House of Representatives, the first question is usually asked of the prime minister by the Leader of the Opposition. Similar arrangements apply in the Senate. To accommodate the distribution of ministers between both chambers, ministers also take on representative roles, answering questions relating to portfolios that are not their own because the responsible minister sits in the other chamber. This allows questioners to ask questions about any government portfolio in either chamber. This normally includes the Leader of the Government in the Senate representing the prime minister in response to questions asked by senators about general government policy. Sometimes a government Minister will arrange for a government backbencher to "ask" a question, commonly called a Dorothy Dixer, to enable the Minister to make a political speech or otherwise score political points.Convention allows the prime minister in the House, and the Leader of the Government in the Senate, to terminate question time by asking that "further questions be placed on the Notice Paper". This is not a formal motion but an indication that, even if further questions were asked, ministers would not answer them since they are not compelled to do so. It is possible in this way to prematurely terminate question time, although this is rare in the House and essentially unheard of in the Senate. During the Keating Government, the prime minister attempted to limit the number of questions asked in a way the Liberal Opposition disapproved of. To protest the change, the Opposition made random quorum calls through the afternoon for every question they felt they had been denied that day. In the House, question time is generally scheduled from 2pm to 3:15 pm on every sitting day; in the Senate, it generally occurs from 2pm to 3pm. Apart from divisions, it is the only time the chamber is likely to be filled.
Tactically, it is considered an important defining characteristic for an Opposition Leader to be able ask a pertinent question of the prime minister or premier, or to single out perceived weak performers in the Ministry.
Interjections from both government and opposition members in the House of Representatives and the Senate are common, and broadly speaking are an accepted practice, although the speaker of the House or the president of the Senate will intervene if interjections become too frequent, if they contain inappropriate content, or if the member interjecting is disrupting debate. Given that question time is the only time of day when all members of Parliament are in their respective chambers, the appearance of question time can be rowdy and boisterous compared to the normally sedate activity during the rest of the day.
In the past, questions and answers had no time limits. Following the 2010 federal election, changes to the standing orders imposed a 45-second time limit for questions and a four-minute time limit for answers in the House of Representatives. This was reduced to 30 seconds for questions and three minutes for answers when the standing orders were again amended following the 2022 federal election. In the Senate, a questioner may ask an initial question and two supplementary questions related to their initial question. Each question has a one-minute time limit. Answers to initial questions are limited to three minutes, and answers to supplementary questions are limited to one minute. A senator may also move to 'take note' of a minister's answer after question time, allowing questioners to respond to the answers provided by ministers.
It is very common for points of order to be raised during question time on the issue of relevance, as a Minister answering questions will normally attempt to redirect the answer to an attack on their opponents. However, as long as the Minister is talking on the general subject of the matter raised in the question, it is usually considered relevant to the question, even if it does not address the specific issue raised in the question at all.
State parliaments adopt similar practices to the federal Parliament with the exception of the Parliament of Victoria, where, since 2015, government backbenchers are no longer entitled to ask questions during question time. As a replacement, ministers can make two-minute ministerial statements to the chamber.
Question time has been broadcast on ABC Radio since 1946 and televised since 1991 by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
There is a common misperception that question time is solely about asking questions to ministers as there are uncommon occurrences of questions being asked to members of Parliament who are not ministers, including opposition members, as the standing orders provide.
Canada
Question time in the House of Commons of Canada, colloquially referred to as Question Period, and formally known as Oral Questions, occurs during each sitting day in the House of Commons. The questions may be posed to either the prime minister of Canada, or any minister of the Cabinet of Canada.In addition to the House of Commons of Canada, question period is also a convention that is practiced in the various legislative bodies of the provinces and territories of Canada. Like the federal House of Commons, Question Period in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario is formally known as Oral Questions. In the Quebec National Assembly, the practice is called Oral Questions and Answers.
India
Ireland
In the Oireachtas, Ireland's parliament, questions are asked in Dáil Éireann, the lower house, to which the government of Ireland is responsible. The Ceann Comhairle has wide discretion on allowing questions, which are directed to the minister in charge of the relevant Department of State. A question may be answered by any cabinet minister due to cabinet collective responsibility, or by a Minister of State at the relevant Department of State. Questions requiring departmental research may not have an answer available within the three-day notice period; these tend to be submitted for written rather than oral response. The Ceann Comhairle may permit a supplementary question to an oral response. Reforms in 2016 at the start of the 32nd Dáil created separate time slots for different types of question, and empower the Ceann Comhairle to demand a further response if the initial one is deemed inadequate.Japan
The Diet of Japan held its first question time on 10 November 1999; the first question asked to Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi was "Prime Minister, what did you have for breakfast this morning?". Japan's question time was closely modeled after that of the UK, and many Diet members travelled to the House of Commons to study the British application of the concept.According Prime Minister's Official Residence HP, it is called "Deliberation between Party Leaders" in English. Question time is 45 minutes long and questions are limited to the leaders of parliamentary caucuses. Although it is generally held every week while the Diet is in session, it may be cancelled with the agreement of the opposition: this often happens during the budgeting period and at other times when the prime minister must sit in the Diet.
Malaysia
of the Dewan Rakyat, the elected house of the Parliament of Malaysia, announced in February 2023 that the upcoming sitting would see the introduction of both Prime Minister's Questions and Minister's Questions: "We suggest that the session be held every Tuesday for Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to answer questions that are addressed to him and on Thursday, there will be the Minister's Question Time session." He described this as a pilot, and said that amendments to the house's standing orders would be required to make question time a regular part of parliamentary proceedings.New Zealand
Oral questions
Questions asked to ministers must be concise and related to the area of the minister's responsibility. Questions require that all facts be authenticated. Before a question is asked it is checked that it meets the requirements of the House's standing orders, before being transmitted to the relevant ministers.In New Zealand oral questions are asked at 2pm on each sitting day. Twelve principal oral questions are asked, with supplementary questions also given that must relate to the initial subject matter. The opportunity to ask questions is equally shared amongst the members of the house, excluding ministers. Urgent questions, while possible, are uncommon.
The question is addressed to the portfolio of the minister receiving the question, and the questioner must ask the question as written. Once a question is asked, supplementary questions can be asked.
SKY News New Zealand broadcasts this session from 2pm to the conclusion of questioning. Also, New Zealand's free-to-air digital television network, Freeview, provides live coverage of the debating chamber when it is in session on Parliament TV.