The most senior members are the prime minister, secretaries of state, Ministers of state and parliamentary under-secretaries. The Prime minister has the duty of being in charge and selects the other members of government. There are many important departments in central government and they all are crucial but are different roles in controlling the country. The departments include home office and department of health, but also involve sport and media and the department of culture. These departments are ruled by Secretaries state that has complete liability and are staffed by impartial civil servants who get their income from money provided by parliament.
b) Using your own knowledge as well as the extract, explain why recent reforms can be said to have made the House of Lords more legitimate. Recent reforms have made the House of Lords more legitimate, the 2001 reforms made by Blair’s government meant that that most hereditary peers were no longer part of the Lords – this meant that the people in the Lords were not their because of their blood but because of their expertise and interest in subjects relating to discussing inside the chamber. Blair, by removing hereditary peers made the Lords more accountable and more professional. The Lords become a real discussion based chamber with key figures from around the country invited to discuss and debate topics which meant something to them. However, the Lords have always had a strong hold on the Commons, overriding them more times than the government’s own backbenchers.
Should the Westminster electoral system be reformed? The Westminster electoral system has been a target for reform for a long time. Despite the loss in the 2011 referendum, reform is still wanted by a number of people especially the Liberal Democrats who will benefit the most. First Past the Post is the system that Westminster uses for election to the Houses of Commons it is a simple majority or plurality system that requires a candidate to get more votes than anyone else. One argument that the Westminster electoral system should be reformed is that First Past the Post doesn't give the social representation that other system gives, for example in the Parliament elected in 2010, women, 51% of the population, are represented by 22% of Parliament therefore an under representation, however, university educated are overrepresented, 91% of the Houses of Commons represent 31% of the population but having PR doesn't guarantee that the social composition of Parliament only making the percentage of votes more proportional towards the seats.
The Liberal Democrats entered into coalition talks with the Conservative Party and the Labour Party. The liberal democrats chose to go with the conservatives, together making the majority vote. This meant the new government was formed, ending 13 years of labour government, also with labours leader Gordon Brown resigning as prime minister and being taken over by David Cameron of conservative party and his deputy Nick Clegg of liberal democrats. Who is entitled to stand for election Candidates in a UK General Election must be 18 or above and a citizen of Britain, the republic of Ireland or a commonwealth country. A person will be stopped from standing for election if they have been declared bankrupt, they are in prison serving a sentence of at least 12 months, they have been found guilty of past election offences, they are already able to vote in the house of lords or they are a police officer, a member of the armed forces or a judge.
The Party system in the UK has existed in some form since the 18th century. Political parties are an extremely powerful force in the legislative process, and government in general. Without an efficient party structure, a government would find it incredibly hard to carry out their work and to pass bills through parliament. Around 100 government MPs have some kind of ministerial role whilst being aligned to a political party. The government need to be able to rely on the MPs support for bills in parliament and regardless of the majority, there could more than 200 backbench MPs that need to be organised by a political party.
“The electoral college should be replaced by a national popular vote.” Discuss (45) The Electoral College is an institution that was established by the founding Fathers to elect the President of the United States indirectly. The Electoral College is a system that should be abolished and replaced by direct election through a national popular vote. Supporters of the national popular vote make convincing arguments that it is the best system to decide the Presidential election in a society as vast as the United States. However, there are arguments that suggest the Electoral College should not be replaced by a national popular vote. When evaluating the arguments raised on both sides it I believe that the Electoral College should be replaced by a national popular vote.
Despite of this, Labour decided not to move ahead with the reforms. This shows that first past the post benefits the government in power because the party has majority of the votes in parliament in which makes it difficult for the other party to be heard if they want changes. Furthermore, tactical voting on first past the post encourages voters to vote for a candidate who has a better chance of winning. It prevents the election of a candidate representing the most disliked party. Example for this is in 1997 many Lib Dem and Labour voter tactically voted to get sitting Conservative
Both sides are attempting to play political hardball. During the 2010 campaign, the Republicans promised to cut $100 billion from the budget for 2011 and they know that Tea Party activists are going to hold them accountable. The Democrats control the Senate and the presidency and they probably figure that when push comes to shove that many of the new, inexperienced Republicans in the House can be intimidated into giving in. But in the end it really doesn't matter that much who wins this battle. The Republicans are proposing $61 billion in budget cuts which would cut the budget deficit for 2011 by only 3.8 percent.
Each branch “checks” the power of the other branches to make sure that the power is balanced between them. When a president vetos a bill it is considered apart of checks and balances historically Andrew Jackson vetoed around twenty bills, he was the first to do this. e.) The idea of The Electoral College. In the early days of America they had a debate on how the president should be elected. One idea was to have him selected by the congress, this idea was thrown out because people thought that it would be used to serve the congresses purpose.
The Electoral College is the main part of the government that elects the president. Article II section I of the constitution establishes that each state is set up to have as many electors equal to their number of senators and representative in congress (Patterson A-10). When the presidential election time comes around these electors cast their votes and decide the president based of what their district wanted. The reason this system was set up was because the framers were afraid that a direct vote would link executive power to popular majorities (Patterson