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Ministerial Code (United Kingdom)
The Ministerial Code is a document setting out "rules" and standards for government ministers in the United Kingdom. Separate codes exist for ministers of the Scottish Government, the Northern Ireland Executive (based on the St Andrews Agreement) and the Welsh Government. History and status Codes of conduct for ministers are amongst a range of initiatives designed to respond to perceptions of the erosion of ministerial accountability, and to preserve public trust in the institutions of cabinet government. Written guidance for British cabinet ministers began as the document ''Questions of Procedure for Ministers'' (QPM), which was a confidential document prepared by the Cabinet Office to assist ministers, and dates to at least the 1980s. The earliest published form of the Code is a result of the QPM's release by the Major Government in 1992. Further editions have been based on suggestions and recommendations from the Committee on Standards in Public Life. The first edition to be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cabinet (UK)
The Cabinet of the United Kingdom is the senior decision-making body of His Majesty's Government. A committee of the Privy Council, it is chaired by the prime minister and its members include secretaries of state and other senior ministers. The Ministerial Code says that the business of the Cabinet (and cabinet committees) is mainly questions of major issues of policy, questions of critical importance to the public and questions on which there is an unresolved argument between departments. History Until at least the 16th century, individual officers of state had separate property, powers and responsibilities granted with their separate offices by royal command, and the Crown and the Privy Council constituted the only co-ordinating authorities. In England, phrases such as "cabinet counsel", meaning advice given in private, in a cabinet in the sense of a small room, to the monarch, occur from the late 16th century, and, given the non-standardised spelling of the day, it is oft ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parliament Of The United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative supremacy and thereby ultimate power over all other political bodies in the UK and the overseas territories. Parliament is bicameral but has three parts, consisting of the sovereign ( King-in-Parliament), the House of Lords, and the House of Commons (the primary chamber). In theory, power is officially vested in the King-in-Parliament. However, the Crown normally acts on the advice of the prime minister, and the powers of the House of Lords are limited to only delaying legislation; thus power is ''de facto'' vested in the House of Commons. The House of Commons is an elected chamber with elections to 650 single-member constituencies held at least every five years under the first-past-the-post system. By constitutional convention, all governme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Guardian Media Group, owned by the Scott Trust. The trust was created in 1936 to "secure the financial and editorial independence of ''The Guardian'' in perpetuity and to safeguard the journalistic freedom and liberal values of ''The Guardian'' free from commercial or political interference". The trust was converted into a limited company in 2008, with a constitution written so as to maintain for ''The Guardian'' the same protections as were built into the structure of the Scott Trust by its creators. Profits are reinvested in journalism rather than distributed to owners or shareholders. It is considered a newspaper of record in the UK. The editor-in-chief Katharine Viner succeeded Alan Rusbridger in 2015. Since 2018, the paper's main news ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Permanent Secretary (United Kingdom)
A permanent under-secretary of state, known informally as a permanent secretary, is the most senior civil servant of a ministry in the United Kingdom, charged with running the department on a day-to-day basis. Similar offices, often employing different terms, exist in many other Westminster-style systems and in some other governments. In the United States, the equivalent position is a Deputy Secretary of an executive department, though British permanent secretaries are career civil servants (whereas Deputy Secretaries are political appointees). Permanent secretaries are appointed under a scheme in which the prime minister has the final say in the recruitment process; the PM now chooses directly from a list created by the Civil Service Commissioners, rather than only having a veto over the Commissioners' preferred candidate. The first permanent secretary to be appointed in this way was Melanie Dawes in the Department for Communities and Local Government. Some permanent secretari ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Member Of Parliament (United Kingdom)
In the United Kingdom, a member of Parliament (MP) is an individual elected to serve in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Electoral system All 650 members of the UK House of Commons are elected using the first-past-the-post voting system in single member constituencies across the whole of the United Kingdom, where each constituency has its own single representative. Elections All MP positions become simultaneously vacant for elections held on a five-year cycle, or when a snap election is called. The Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 set out that ordinary general elections are held on the first Thursday in May, every five years. The Act was repealed in 2022. With approval from Parliament, both the 2017 and 2019 general elections were held earlier than the schedule set by the Act. If a vacancy arises at another time, due to death or resignation, then a constituency vacancy may be filled by a by-election. Under the Representation of the People Act 198 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constituency
An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger State (polity), state (a country, administrative region, or other polity) created to provide its population with representation in the larger state's legislative body. That body, or the state's constitution or a body established for that purpose, determines each district's boundaries and whether each will be represented by a Single-member district, single member or multiple members. Generally, only voters (''constituents'') who Residency (domicile), reside within the district are permitted to vote in an election held there. District representatives may be elected by a first past the post, first-past-the-post system, a Proportional representation, proportional representative system, or another voting system, voting method. They may be selected by a direct election under universal suffrage, an ind ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Departments Of The United Kingdom Government
The Government of the United Kingdom is divided up into departments. These, according to the government, are responsible for putting government policy into practice. There are currently 23 ministerial departments, 20 non-ministerial departments and 419 agencies and other public bodies. Ministerial departments Ministerial departments are generally the most high-profile government departments and differ from the other two types of government departments in that they include ministers. List Non-ministerial departments Non-ministerial departments are headed by civil servants and usually have a regulatory or inspection function. List Agencies and other public bodies Government departments in this third and final category can generally be split into five types: * Executive agencies An executive agency is a part of a government department that is treated as managerially and budgetarily separate, to carry out some part of the executive functions of the United King ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British House Of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 members known as members of Parliament (MPs). MPs are elected to represent constituencies by the first-past-the-post system and hold their seats until Parliament is dissolved. The House of Commons of England started to evolve in the 13th and 14th centuries. In 1707 it became the House of Commons of Great Britain after the political union with Scotland, and from 1800 it also became the House of Commons for Ireland after the political union of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922, the body became the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland after the independence of the Irish Free State. Under the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the Lords' power to reject legislation was reduced to a delaying power. The gov ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Payroll Vote
The payroll vote is a term in the British parliamentary system for Members of Parliament who concurrently hold Government positions. It includes ministers and Parliamentary Private Secretaries. Even though the last are unpaid, they are widely regarded as being on the "first rung of the ministerial ladder". There is a commonly-observed convention in the British constitution that all government ministers, including the Prime Minister, be members of either the House of Commons or the House of Lords, although this is not always strictly observed. Under the principle of Cabinet collective responsibility, all ministers must publicly support the position of the Government. Any minister who wishes to vote against the Government in Parliament is obliged to resign from governmental office first. There is therefore a built-in bloc of guaranteed support for the Government on any given parliamentary vote. However, in the votes in the House of Commons on Brexit during the week of 11 March 20 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Backbenchers
In Westminster and other parliamentary systems, a backbencher is a member of parliament (MP) or a legislator who occupies no governmental office and is not a frontbench spokesperson in the Opposition, being instead simply a member of the "rank and file". The term dates from 1855. The term derives from the fact that they sit physically behind the frontbench in the House of Commons. A backbencher may be a new parliamentary member yet to receive high office, a senior figure dropped from government, someone who for whatever reason is not chosen to sit in the government or an opposition spokesperson (such as a shadow cabinet if one exists), or someone who prefers to be a background influence, not in the spotlight. By extension, those who are not reliable supporters of all of their party's goals and policies and have resigned or been forced to resign may be relegated to the back benches. For example, in British political events, Clive Lewis became a backbencher after resigning ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parliamentary Private Secretary
A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a minister or shadow minister. They are selected from backbench MPs as the 'eyes and ears' of the minister in the House of Commons. PPSs are junior to Parliamentary Under-Secretaries of State, a ministerial post salaried by one or more departments. Duties and powers of a PPS Although not paid other than their salary as an MP, PPSs help the government to track backbench opinion in Parliament. They are subject to some restrictions as outlined in the Ministerial Code of the British government but are not members of the Government. A PPS can sit on select committees but must avoid "associating themselves with recommendations critical of, or embarrassing to the Government", and must not make statements or ask questions on matters affecting the minister's department. In particular, the PPS in the Department for Communities and Local Government may not ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Civil Service (United Kingdom)
His Majesty's Home Civil Service, also known as His Majesty's Civil Service, the Home Civil Service, or colloquially as the Civil Service is the permanent bureaucracy or secretariat of Crown employees that supports His Majesty's Government, which is led by a cabinet of ministers chosen by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as well as two of the three devolved administrations: the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government, but not the Northern Ireland Executive. As in other states that employ the Westminster political system, His Majesty's Home Civil Service forms an inseparable part of the British government. The executive decisions of government ministers are implemented by HM Civil Service. Civil servants are employees of the Crown and not of the British parliament. Civil servants also have some traditional and statutory responsibilities which to some extent protect them from being used for the political advantage of the party ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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