Ask Me Something I Know: Cabinet Members in Question Time

Abstract

Question Time (QT) in parliamentary democracies allows parliamentarians (MPs) to publicly scrutinise the government and influence the policy agenda. This paper explores how the other side, the cabinet members, make use of the event. Prime Minister (PM) and other ministers have incentives to inform and persuade the public and might adjust their responses to oral questions accordingly. The paper tests this expectation on the responses of Croatian cabinet members in QT between 2003 and 2020. The analysis demonstrates that when ministers respond to the questions from co-partisan MPs, which are likely coordinated within the party, their responses include more numerical evidence. Moreover, both PMs and ministers respond to their co-partisan MPs with a more positive sentiment, which is driven by the positive sentiment of the respective questions. These findings have important implications for executive-legislative relations, the quality of parliamentary scrutiny and the public perception of parliament.