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Commission On Parliamentary Reform
The Commission on Parliamentary Reform was an independent group, established in October 2016 by Ken Macintosh, the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament. It is chaired by John McCormick and published its report, with recommendations, on 20 June 2017. Background When the Scottish Parliament was set up in 1999, a Consultative Steering Group developed some of the parliamentary structures and procedures. Changes in technology since the Parliament was formed have affected how civil society engages with it. Macintosh’s predecessor Tricia Marwick had also tried to look at how the parliament functioned. Remit and schedule The Commission was asked to consider how the Parliament scrutinises legislation, how the committee system functions and the extent of the parliament's independence from the Scottish government. The commission met for first time on 7 November 2016. In January the committee took evidence from two former Labour First Ministers Jack McConnell and Henry McLeish. Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ken Macintosh
Kenneth Donald Macintosh (born 15 January 1962) is a Scottish politician who served as the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament from 2016 to 2021. Elected as a member of Scottish Labour, he suspended his party membership on becoming Presiding Officer. Macintosh was a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) from 1999 to 2021, representing the Eastwood constituency from 1999 to 2016, and then the West Scotland region from 2016 to 2021. Born in Inverness, Macintosh was employed between 1987 and 1999 as a television producer for the BBC, working on its news broadcasts and election coverage. He was first elected in the 1999 Scottish Parliament election as a Scottish Labour and Co-operative Party candidate, and retained his seat of Eastwood in the 2003, 2007 and the 2011 elections, but lost it in the 2016 election. In that election, he was returned on the regional list. Early life Family background and education Kenneth Donald Macintosh was born on 15 January 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Law Society Of Scotland
The Law Society of Scotland is the professional governing body for Scottish solicitors. It promotes excellence among solicitors through the support and regulation of its members. It also promotes the interests of the public in relation to the profession. The Society helps to shape the law for the benefit of both the public and the profession. The Society was established by statute in 1949 and its rules are set out in the Solicitors (Scotland) Act 1980. All practising solicitors, currently around 10,500, are members. The Society is funded by its members and has an annual budget of almost £8 million. History Lawyers in Scotland have been organised in professional bodies since at least the sixteenth century. The Faculty of Advocates was established as the body for practising advocates in 1532, though its origins are thought to date from even earlier. Other lawyers were represented by associations and faculties of procurators and solicitors. Among those that still exist, the S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Commissions And Inquiries
Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish identity and common culture *Scottish people, a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland *Scots language, a West Germanic language spoken in lowland Scotland *Symphony No. 3 (Mendelssohn), a symphony by Felix Mendelssohn known as ''the Scottish'' See also *Scotch (other) *Scotland (other) *Scots (other) *Scottian (other) *Schottische The schottische is a partnered country dance that apparently originated in Bohemia. It was popular in Victorian era ballrooms as a part of the Bohemian folk-dance craze and left its traces in folk music of countries such as Argentina ("chotis"Span ... * {{disambiguation Language and nationality disambiguation pages ca:Escocès ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First Minister's Questions (Scottish Parliament)
First Minister's Questions (FMQs) is the name given to the weekly questioning of the First Minister in the Scottish Parliament. It serves the purpose of holding the Scottish Government to account and the format has evolved over time. First Minister's Questions follows in some of the traditions of Prime Minister's Questions in the House of Commons. Other devolved administrations in the United Kingdom also have sessions for the question times of their leaders that take the same name. An independent report published in 2017 suggested further reforms. Procedure and format There are rules and procedures about who can submit a question. The Presiding Officer selects questions from all of those lodged by Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs). History In 2000, during the 1st Scottish Parliament, the procedures committee recommended that a specific First Minister’s Question Time be set up, to last for up to twenty minutes out of the hour set aside for the questioning of Ministe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts European legislation, following a proposal by the European Commission. The Parliament is composed of 705 members (MEPs). It represents the second-largest democratic electorate in the world (after the Parliament of India), with an electorate of 375 million eligible voters in 2009. Since 1979, the Parliament has been directly elected every five years by the citizens of the European Union through universal suffrage. Voter turnout in parliamentary elections decreased each time after 1979 until 2019, when voter turnout increased by eight percentage points, and rose above 50% for the first time since 1994. The voting age is 18 in all EU member states except for Malta and Austria, where it is 16, and Greece, where it is 17. Although the E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Liberal Democrats
The Scottish Liberal Democrats ( gd, Pàrtaidh Libearal Deamocratach na h-Alba, sco, Scots Leeberal Democrats) is a liberal, federalist political party in Scotland, a part of the United Kingdom Liberal Democrats. The party currently holds 4 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament and 4 of the 59 Scottish seats in the House of Commons. The Scottish Liberal Democrats is one of the three state parties within the federal Liberal Democrats, the others being the Welsh Liberal Democrats and the English Liberal Democrats. The Liberal Democrats do not contest elections in Northern Ireland. History Formation and early years The Scottish Liberal Democrat party was formed by the merger of the Scottish Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in Scotland, as part of the merger of the Liberal Party and SDP on 3 March 1988. The party campaigned for the creation of a devolved Scottish Parliament as part of its wider policy of a federal United Kingdom. In the late 1980s an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jeremy Purvis
Jeremy Purvis, Baron Purvis of Tweed (born 15 January 1974) is a Scottish Liberal Democrat politician. He was the Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale from 2003 to 2011. In August 2013 it was announced that he would be elevated to the House of Lords. He is the leader of the Devo Plus cross-party group. Background He was born in Berwick-upon-Tweed, England, where he later attended school. He studied Politics and Modern History at Brunel University in London, graduating in 1996. While at university he worked for the ELDR (Liberal) Group in the European Parliament and Liberal International. Career On graduating, Purvis worked full-time for Sir David Steel in the House of Commons and then ran his office in the House of Lords. In 1998 he moved to Edinburgh to work for a parliamentary affairs company and in 2001 he established, with a fellow director, his own strategic communications consultancy, advising clients on communications. He w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Green Party
The Scottish Greens (also known as the Scottish Green Party; gd, Pàrtaidh Uaine na h-Alba ; sco, Scots Green Pairtie) are a green political party in Scotland. The party has seven MSPs in the Scottish Parliament as of May 2021. As of the 2022 local elections, the party sits on 13 of the 32 Scottish local councils, with a total of 35 councillors. They hold two ministerial posts in the third Sturgeon government following a power-sharing agreement with the SNP in August 2021, marking the first time Green party politicians will be in government in the UK. The Scottish Greens were created in 1990 when the former Green Party separated into two independent parties, representing Scotland and England and Wales. The party is affiliated to the Global Greens and the European Green Party. Party membership increased dramatically following the Scottish independence referendum, during which it supported Scotland's independence from the United Kingdom. Organisation The Scottish Greens ar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Finnie
John Bradford Finnie (born 31 December 1956) is a Scottish Greens politician. He was the Green Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Highlands and Islands region from 2016 up until 2021, having previously sat as a Scottish National Party (SNP) member from 2011 to 2012 then as an independent from 2012 to 2016. He was formerly a police officer and then a councillor. Early life Finnie was born in Clunes, and was educated at Achnacarry Primary and Lochaber High School. Police Finnie became a police officer in 1976 and served with the Lothian and Borders Police and then as a uniformed Constable, latterly a Constable Dog Handler within the Northern Constabulary. He was a full-time elected official – Constable Secretary, local branch of the Scottish Police Federation (SPF). Political career Finnie developed political awareness while still at High School and joined the SNP at 16 years old. He first stood as a candidate in a 2006 by-election for a Highland Council seat. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Labour
Scottish Labour ( gd, Pàrtaidh Làbarach na h-Alba, sco, Scots Labour Pairty; officially the Scottish Labour Party) is a social democratic political party in Scotland. It is an autonomous section of the UK Labour Party. From their peak of holding 56 of the 129 seats at the first Scottish parliament election in 1999, the Party has lost seats at each Holyrood election, returning 22 MSPs at the 2021 election. The party currently holds one of 59 Scottish seats in the UK House of Commons, with Ian Murray having represented Edinburgh South continuously since 2010. Throughout the later decades of the 20th century and into the first years of the 21st, Labour dominated politics in Scotland; winning the largest share of the vote in Scotland at every UK general election from 1964 to 2010, every European Parliament election from 1984 to 2004 and in the first two elections to the Scottish Parliament in 1999 and 2003. After this, Scottish Labour formed a coalition with the Scotti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Lamont
Johann MacDougall Lamont (; born 11 July 1957) is a Scottish Labour Co-operative politician who served as Leader of the Scottish Labour Party from 2011 to 2014. She was previously a junior Scottish Executive minister from 2004 to 2007 and Deputy Leader of the Scottish Labour Party from 2008 until her election to the leadership in 2011. In addition to her ministerial and leadership roles, she has been a campaigner on equality issues and violence against women throughout her political career. Born in Glasgow, Lamont attended Woodside Secondary School and obtained a degree from the University of Glasgow. After studying for teaching qualifications at Jordanhill College, she became a schoolteacher. Active in the Labour Party since she was at university, Lamont served on its Scottish Executive Committee, and chaired it in 1993. With the establishment of a devolved legislature in Scotland, she was elected as the Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for Glasgow Pollok in 1999. H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scottish Conservative And Unionist Party
The Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party ( gd, Pàrtaidh Tòraidheach na h-Alba, sco, Scots Tory an Unionist Pairty), often known simply as the Scottish Conservatives and colloquially as the Scottish Tories, is a centre-right political party in Scotland. It is the second-largest party in the Scottish Parliament and the third-largest in Scottish local government. The party has the second-largest number of Scottish MPs in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom and the seventh overall. The Leader of the party is Douglas Ross. He replaced Jackson Carlaw, who briefly served from February to July 2020; Carlaw had in turn taken over from Ruth Davidson, who held the post from 2011 to 2019. The party has no Chief Whip at Westminster, which is instead represented by the Chief Whip of the Conservative Party in England. In the 2017 UK general election, the party increased its number of MPs to 13 on 28.6 percent of the popular vote – its best performance since 1983 and in terms ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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