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Ballot gives MPs a chance to change the law
The winners of a ballot to decide which MPs will get the best chance to pass their own legislation have been announced.
Private members' bills allow individual MPs to introduce their own piece of legislation.
They usually do so in co-operation with a charity or campaign group, and those near the top of the ballot can expect to be inundated with requests from such organisations asking them to take up a particular cause.
Two Conservative MPs, Patrick Mercer and Nigel Evans, came at the top of the ballot.
They were followed by Labour MPs Stephen Hepburn, Julie Morgan, Kevin Barron and Kevan Jones.
The SNP's Michael Weir took the eighth position in the list while the highest placed Liberal Democrat was Andrew Stunell in eleventh.
While very few private members' bills actually make it on to the statute book, those MPs lucky enough to appear near the top of the list will have the best chance of securing a change in the law.
Commons procedures allow a limited amount of time for consideration of these bills, and consequently they are susceptible to being talked out.
And with a general election expected next May, the time available for passing such bills will be even shorter than usual.
However, some of the most controversial issues in public life have been tackled through such legislation.
Famously, former Liberal MP, and now a Liberal Democrat peer, David Steel liberalised Britain's abortion laws using a private members' bill.
Health and safety
Among the first organisations to seek the support of MPs was a coalition of top unions.
The Transport and General Workers' Union and the Union of Construction, Allied Trades and Technicians called for a private members' bill that would hold individual directors to account for workplace casualties.
"The law has to support victims of health and safety negligence, not protect the bosses whose recklessness kills," said TGWU general secretary Tony Woodley.
"Workers are losing their lives and it is only right that companies are held accountable for safety in the same way they are for financial impropriety."
The unions said that in the last 10 years there had been just six successful prosecutions for corporate manslaughter, and none against big companies.
Alan Ritchie, UCATT general secretary, said it was important "that negligent employers, corporations and individual directors can be brought to justice as a direct result of their actions".
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