The National Legislative Assembly has rushed through a bill to amend the 2014 interim constitution and increase their number by 30 members, from 220 to 250, by a vote of 189-0 with three abstentions.
The bill was proposed on Thursday by the cabinet and the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) for the NLA to consider in three straight readings.
Deputy Prime Ministers Prawit Wongsuwon and Wissanu Krea-ngam, and PM's Office Minister Suwaphan Tanyuvardhana were present to defend the proposal in Friday's NLA meeting.
Gen Prawit explained to the NLA that the cabinet and the NCPO understood and attached high importance to the work of the NLA, which had a large number of legislative drafts for consideration.
The cabinet and the NCPO proposed an increase of NLA members from 220 to a maximum 250 to cushion the workload and expedite the legislative process, he said.
Mr Wissanu said the amendment had four sections, with Section 3 proposing the number of NLA members be increased to no more than 250. To make it clear, Section 4 stated that the existing NLA members would continue to serve in their current positions.
He said the existing 220 members might not be enough to handle the increasing legislative load. In the next 16 months a large amount of legislation would be tabled for deliberation. This included about 100 bills for the implementation of the government's policies, and about 80 other bills to be deliberated as required by the new charter.
Much of the legislation had to be passed within a fixed timeframe, such as in 120 days, 240 days or one year.
Mr Wissanu said the legislation included the 10 organic laws, particularly four which related to elections, of which deliberation must be completed within 60 days of being submitted to the NLA.
The deputy prime minister said he did not know what criteria would the NCPO would use to select the 30 additional members. In his opinion, they would not necessarily be experts in law, but must be resourceful in several branches of knowledge. More importantly, they must be able to work with other people.
NLA members Somchai Sawaengkarn and Wallop Tangkhananulak then took the floor to speak in support of the proposed amendment.
The NLA then voted 186-0 with three abstentions to pass the bill in the first reading. After going through the second reading, the bill was passed in the third reading with a vote of 189-0 with three abstentions.
The bill will become law when published in the Royal Gazette.