Due to the increasing presidential style of recent prime ministers and the party loyalty of the executive one can consider Parliament’s control of executive power minimal. However, due to the development of independent bodies surrounding Select Committees and the delaying of legislation by the House of Lords it can still be argued to be effective. The government usually has an overall majority. This is due to our voting system of FPTP which gives preference to the two main parties, normally giving them majorities (and increasingly large ones) as opposed to coalitions and minority governments which are produced through other voting systems such as AV in Scotland and Wales. Although we are currently in a coalition the government still has a majority through the combination of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats.
A voter could switch from voting for the Conservatives to vote for the Labour Party at the next election because they decide according to single issues. In general the public today is not really aligned to parties anymore. I would say that party allegiance is something which is nearly vanished in Britain’s voting behavior. There are still groups which are strongly related to one or the other party but that is not as common as was in the 50s and 60s. The important things today are which party has at the moment the right promises for the single voter and which party is better in delivering policy goals.
To what extent is Liberalism the dominant ideology in British politics? The term liberalism is generally associated with ideas such as liberty and equal rights. Associated with it are ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections and human rights. The UK government incorporates all the key aspects of liberalism in to their own organisation such as the fact that Britain comes from a constitution and the laws and rights of citizens are drawn from it. Liberalism was drawn from the age of enlightenment in which many religious restrictions were broken in order for meritocracy to strive which allowed individuals to strive on their own basis.
However the executive power can and has to be constrained to ensure a more democratic system of governance. It could be argued that in the US the executive has limited power on the domestic front whereas the UK executive is less constrained and appears to have significant power in most areas of political life. It is perhaps useful to start with saying what executive branches are made of in both liberal democracies that are being examined. In the UK the core executive includes the Prime Minister, the Cabinet and its committees, the Prime Minister’s office and the Cabinet Office. In the US the executive branch is associated with the President, the Vice President, Executive Departments, and Agencies.
It is difficult for a Backbench MP to influence government policy if a government has a large majority in Parliament. The power of individual backbench MPs is reduced making it harder to challenge the government. Also, the PM has powers of patronage which demand loyalty; few MPs want to cause a general election by defeating the government. Thus accepting their fate as lobby
It has been argued though, that we now have Prime Ministerial Government as opposed to Cabinet Government, due to the shift in power towards the Prime Minister over the years from Thatcher to Blair. More important than head of the Cabinet, the Prime Minister is the leader of the
To answer this question one has to first describe and provide reasons for the rules which govern the legislative powers of the House of Lords in comparison to those of the House of Commons. To properly appreciate the rules one should determine the composition of the people who are subject to the rules first. Each member of the House of Commons represents a constituent of the UK and is voted for by that constituent, voting takes place once every term of parliament. Members of the House of Lords are selected not on a voting basis and are chosen from one of the two following methods. Hereditary members are those who inherit their status as from their family, non-hereditary members are chosen by the prime minister in recognition to their expertise to become life peers.
Scott martin – extended essay - liberal reforms Question – how successfully did the Liberal government (1906-14). Tackle the problem of poverty? Many historians argue the liberals effectively tackled the problem of poverty once elected in 1906 in their landslide victory. Once the party was elected however it was still very much in favour of its laissez-faire policy and social reform was not high in its parties priorities, it took significant time and pressure also some very notable individuals such as Lloyd George or Winston Churchill to change the course of Britain’s welfare system and unwittingly perhaps set up the foundations of the welfare state in the future. This essay will show how the liberals aimed to tackle the problem of
equally important is the election of the president at the time of the assembly election. The head of the government is head of state: Whereas in pre-parliamentary monarchies the head of state was also the head of the government, in the presidential system it is the head of the government who becomes at the same time head of state. The president appoints heads of departments who are his subordinates: In parliamentarism the prime minister appoints his colleagues who together with him form the government. In presidential systems the president appoints secretaries, who are heads of his executive departments. The
How good a democracy is Britain The article “How good a democracy is Britain” written by Prof. Stein Ringen from University of Oxford in Fabruary 2007 deals with the problem of democracy in Britain. The author expresses his opinion that the state of British democracy is very poor. Ranking the most respected democracies from 8 to 3 he has put Britain on level 3 (in comparison Norway is on level 8, Sweden – 7, Germany 4). Despite the fact that for centuries Britain has had firm culture of liberty, has Parliament and its administartion is stable, effective and honest, it is still is not a paragon of the democracy. Thereby, the author highlights that civil and political rights are established in Britain and are not the reasons for such a low ranking level.