Change to a bill intended to prevent its passage through making it useless
This article is about amendments to the text of a bill. For amendments to the motion on reading a bill, see Reasoned amendment.
This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United Kingdom and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. You may improve this article, discuss the issue on the talk page, or create a new article, as appropriate.(July 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Wrecking amendment" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR(July 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
This article possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed.(December 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
This article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. Such statements should be clarified or removed.(December 2015)
(Learn how and when to remove this message)
In legislative debate, a wrecking amendment (also called a poison pill amendment or killer amendment) is an amendment made by a legislator who disagrees with the principles of a bill and who seeks to make it useless (by moving amendments to either make the bill malformed and nonsensical, or to severely change its intent) rather than directly opposing the bill by simply voting against it.[1]
An important character of wrecking amendments is that they are not moved in good faith, that is, the proposer of the amendment would not see the amended legislation as good legislation and would still not vote in favour of the legislation when it came to the final vote if the amendment were accepted. Motives for making them include allowing more debate, delaying the enactment of the legislation, or oftentimes a direct attempt to convince the bill's legislator to withdraw said bill.
Some opponents of particular amendments will describe them as wrecking amendments because they regard the amendments as undermining the unity of the original proposal. Proponents of the amendment may seek to deny the charge by saying that the original proposal brings together different steps, and while personally they oppose all the parts, some parts are even worse than others and legislators should have an opportunity to consider them separately.
Wrecking amendments can pick up more votes than motions against, because observers tend to focus on who voted in favour and against the Bill in the final count, rather than looking at the amendments made during the passage through the legislature.
^"Wrecking Amendment". UK Parliament.
and 22 Related for: Wrecking amendment information
In legislative debate, a wreckingamendment (also called a poison pill amendment or killer amendment) is an amendment made by a legislator who disagrees...
it. It is sometimes called a wreckingamendment, but the term wreckingamendment more often denotes a type of amendment to the bill itself, rather than...
a majority of 18. Like the Leigh amendment, opponents considered the O'Cathain amendment to be a wreckingamendment, and like Leigh, O'Cathain herself...
poison pill shareholders rights amendments inserted in corporate charters as a takeover defence, and wreckingamendments added to legislative bills. During...
Suicide pill, a physical pill for suicide by poison Poison pill amendment or wreckingamendment, an addition to a legislative bill that renders it ineffective...
his amendment at the last minute, on report stage ("consideration"). Frank Harris, a contemporary, wrote that Labouchere proposed it as a wrecking amendment...
Wales ought not to be reduced. This proposal was a skilfully drafted 'wreckingamendment' and when it was passed by 299–291 on 19 April, the Grey government...
offering of reasoned amendments to a motion for second reading of a Government bill, provided such amendments are not wreckingamendments designed to destroy...
voted for the second reading, but also backed what was seen as a "wreckingamendment" and expressed the view that marriage was "traditionally ordained...
Conservative MP Sir Alan Duncan, who dubbed it a wreckingamendment. He voted against recent amendments to the Health and Social Care Bill which has made...
there have been 106 amendments of the Constitution of India since it was first enacted in 1950. There are three types of amendments to the Constitution...
government did not support what he described as “little short of wreckingamendments” to the bill. On 20 July 2023, the bill received royal assent. The...
2004. The bill faced criticism in the House of Lords, including a wreckingamendment from Lord Tebbit (who has described sex reassignment surgery as "mutilation")...
commentators speculated it was a deliberate attempt either to insert a wreckingamendment or to obscure the potential support for May's deal. Since the 2019...
sufficient time to deal with any amendments. Commons Financial Privilege – The Lords will not oppose or make wreckingamendments to bills dealing with taxation...
had its second reading unopposed in the Lords on 4 June, after a "wreckingamendment" proposed by Lord Dear was defeated by a vote of 390–148, thus allowing...
of same-sex marriage. In June 2013, he voted against Lord Dear's wreckingamendment, thus ratifying the same-sex marriage act. He described the 2016 Brexit...
would be tried) because the government abandoned the bill after a wreckingamendment in the House of Lords.[citation needed] The Parliament Act was threatened...
to eight years as a wreckingamendment, expecting that the Irish parliament would reject the bill on principle once any amendment had been made to it...
thousands of wreckingamendments and voting in Māori as each amendment had to be voted on and votes in Māori translated into English. Amendments included...
add many wreckingamendments to the Bill in an attempt to kill it; the Commons had no choice but to pass the Bill with the Lords' amendments because they...
gain royal assent. Alternatively, the Lords could have passed a "wreckingamendment" which would have needed to be reversed by the House of Commons. The...