THE BRITISH POLITICAL SYSTEM

BACKGROUND HISTORY

– The single most important fact in understanding the nature of the British political system is
the fundamental continuity of that system. Britain had no revolutions of the kind
experienced by so many other countries (The US, France, etc.) and Britain has not been
invaded or occupied for almost 1,000 years – the last successful invasion was in 1066 by the
Normans and William the Conqueror.

– The Romans with Julius Caesar had first invaded Britain in 55-54 BC., but the first
significant conquest did not begin until AD 43, under Claudius. The Romans established a
provincial government and steadily extended their control north, but were never able to exert
firm control over Caledonia (= Scotland). Following the conquest of the native Britons, a
distinctive Romano-British culture emerged. The Romans cemented the province's northern
border with Hadrian's Wall, completed around 128. In 142, they pushed the frontier north to
the Forth-Clyde line, constructing the Antonine Wall, but they retreated back to Hadrian's
Wall after approximately twenty years. For much of the later period, Britannia was subject to
barbarian invasion and often came under the control of imperial usurpers and pretenders. The
Romans largely departed from Britain around 410, leading to what is known as the sub-
Roman period, but the legacy of the empire was felt for hundreds of years.

– The English Civil War (1642–1651) was a series of armed conflicts and political
machinations between Parliamentarians (Roundheads) and Royalists (Cavaliers). The first
(1642–46) and second (1648–49) civil wars pitted (= opposed) the supporters of King

1
èCivilisation – The Union Jack or Union Flag represents the regal (= royal) union between England and
Scotland and was specified in a royal decree, according to which the flag of England (a red cross on a white
background, known as St George's Cross), and the flag of Scotland (a white saltire (= Croix de Saint André) on a
blue background, known as the Saltire or St Andrew's Cross), would be joined together, forming the flag of
England and Scotland for maritime purposes.
Charles I against the supporters of the Long Parliament2, while the third war (1649–51) saw
fighting between supporters of King Charles II and supporters of the Rump Parliament3.
The Civil War ended with the Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3
September 1651. The English Civil War led to the trial and execution of Charles I, the exile
of his son, Charles II, and replacement of the English monarchy with, first, the
Commonwealth of England (1649–53), and then with a Protectorate (1653–59), under
Oliver Cromwell's personal rule. Constitutionally, the wars established the precedent that an
English monarch cannot govern without Parliament's consent, although this concept was
legally established only with The Glorious Revolution.

– The Glorious Revolution:

The Glorious Revolution also called the Revolution of 1688, was the overthrow (=
renversement, destitution) of King James II of England (James VII of Scotland and James
II of Ireland) by a union of English Parliamentarians with William of Orange. William's
successful invasion of England with a Dutch fleet (= flotte néerlandaise) and army led to his
ascending of the English throne as William III of England jointly with his wife Mary II of
England. Some people might argue that the English Civil War (1642–1651) was a revolution
in the sense that it saw the abolition of the monarchy – but it only lasted 11 years and the
Glorious Revolution just saw another monarch - William of Orange - take the throne. So far,
the restoration of the Monarchy has lasted 350 years (although it is now, of course, a very
different monarchy). So it can be argued that the British have never had anything equivalent
to the American Revolution (1776) or the French Revolution (1789), they have not been
colonised in a millennium but rather been the greatest colonisers in history, and in neither of
the two world wars were they invaded or occupied. This explains why almost uniquely in

2 The Long Parliament was an English Parliament which lasted from 1640 until 1660. It followed the fiasco of
the Short Parliament which had convened (= met) for only three weeks during the spring of 1640, and which in
turn had followed an 11-year parliamentary absence.
3
In 1648, The Rump Parliament was the English Parliament after Colonel Thomas Pride purged (= reduced)
the number of the Long Parliament members who were hostile to try (= juger) King Charles I for high treason :
Charles I was accused of treason against England by using his power to pursue his personal interest rather than
the good of the country. Charles believed in the divine right of kings, and was determined to govern according to
his own conscience. Many of his subjects opposed his policies, in particular the levying of taxes (= prélèvement
de l’impôt) without parliamentary consent, and perceived his actions as those of a tyrannical absolute monarch.
His religious policies, coupled with his marriage to a Roman Catholic, generated the antipathy and mistrust
of Reformed groups
Note: Rump normally means the hind end or back-side of a mammal. Since 1649, the term "rump parliament"
has been used to refer to any parliament left over from the actual legitimate parliament.

2
the world there is no written constitution (the only other such nations are Israel & New
Zealand); change has been very gradual and pragmatic and built on consensus.

– To simplify British political history, it has essentially been a struggle to shift political power
and accountability (= responsibility) from the all-powerful king who claimed that he obtained
his right to rule from God to a national parliament that was increasingly representative of
ordinary people and accountable to (= responsible to = responsable devant) ordinary people.
There have been many milestones (= jalons) along this long and troubled road to full
democracy. A key date in this evolution was 1215 when King John was forced to sign the
Magna Carta, which involved him sharing power with the barons. This is regarded as the
first statement of citizen rights in the world.

– The so-called Model Parliament was summoned (= convoquer) by King Edward I in

1295 and is regarded as the first representative assembly. Unlike the absolute monarchs of
other parts of Europe, the King of England required the approval of Parliament to tax his
subjects and so, then as now, central to the exercise of power was the ability to raise funds (=
lever des fonds).

– The bicameral nature of the British Parliament – The House of Commons and the
House of Lords - emerged in 1341 and the two-chamber model of the legislature has served
as a model in very many other parliamentary systems.

– The year 2015 was a special year for the British Parliament as it was the 750th anniversary
of the de Montfort Parliament (the first gathering in England that can be called a parliament
in the dictionary sense of the word), along with the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta,
the document that set the scene for the later 1265 de Montfort Parliament.

– The Bill of Rights of 16894 - which is still in effect - lays down limits on the powers of the
crown and sets out the rights of Parliament and rules for freedom of speech in Parliament, the
requirement for regular elections to Parliament, and the right to petition the monarch without
fear of retribution.

– In the 19th century the franchise (= droit de vote) was seriously extended and each
extension was the subject of conflict and opposition. The great Reform Act of 1832 abolished
60 'rotten', or largely unpopulated, boroughs5 and extended the vote from 400,000 citizens

4
SEE Fiche de civilisation – The Bill of Rights (1689); Magna Carta (1215) and Act of settlement (1701).
5
A rotten, decayed, or pocket borough was a parliamentary borough (= a constituency = une circonscription)
that had a very small electorate and could be misused politically.

3
to 600,000, but this legislation - promoted by the Whigs (forerunners (= prédécesseurs) of
the Liberals) - was only carried after being opposed three times by the Tories (forerunners of
the Conservatives). In 1918 Britain achieved a near universal franchise and 1970 saw the last
extension of the franchise (to 18-21-year olds).

– Another important feature of Britain’s political history is that three parts of the United
Kingdom - Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland - have a special status and have local
administrations with a wide range of responsibilities. However, England - which
represents about 84% of the total UK population of around 65 million - does not have a clear
and strong sense of regionalism. So, the British political system does not have anything
equivalent to the federal system of the 50 states in the USA.

– The nature of this disunited Kingdom took on a new form in the General Election of May
2015 when the Scottish National Party won 56 out of 59 seats in Scotland. But in the
General Election of June 2017, the SNP lost more than a third of its seats (The party won only
35 of the 59 Scottish constituencies – a fall of 21 seats from the 56 won 2015). The
Conservatives secured 13 seats in Scotland - the party's best performance in the country since
1983. Labour won seven seats and the Lib Dems four. In the December 12, 2019 general
election (see below in this document), the SNP regained votes.

– The final important part of Britain’s political history is that, in 1973, the country became a
member of the European Union (EU). Therefore, the UK Government and Parliament were
limited in some respects by what they could do because certain areas of policy or decision-
making were a matter for the EU which operated through a European Commission
appointed by the member governments and a European Parliament elected by the citizens of
the member states.

– British membership of the EU was an especially controversial issue for the Conservative
Party and, in the General Election of May 2015, the victorious Conservatives promised an
in/out referendum by the end of 2017. The Brexit referendum was held earlier – on June
23, 2016 – and the Leave side won against all odds (= contre toute attente). David Cameron
resigned, and Theresa May was appointed the new leader of the Conservative party. In
October 2016, she announced that she was in favour of a hard Brexit. After repeatedly
stating that “Brexit means Brexit”, Theresa May triggered Britain’s exit from the European
Union (Article 50) in March 2017, beginning two years of formal negotiations.

4
– In June 2017, Theresa decided to call a snap election (= 3 years earlier than planned)
expecting to cruise to a smashing victory (= arriver sans problème à une victoire écrasante)
that would win her a mandate to see Britain through the long and difficult negotiations with
European leaders over the terms of leaving the union. But the extraordinary gamble (= pari)
Mrs. May made in calling the election backfired (= faire long feu). With not enough seats to
control the House of Commons6 – but still remaining the largest party in the House - she
faced a hung Parliament7. The Conservative Party then formed a minority government and
signed a “confidence and supply” agreement with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

– Theresa May survived a vote of no confidence from Conservative MPs in December 2018
and a Parliamentary vote of no confidence in January 2019. She carried out the Brexit
negotiations with the European Union, adhering to the Chequers Agreement 8 , which
resulted in the Brexit withdrawal agreement. After versions of this agreement were rejected
by Parliament three times, she resigned on July 24, 2019.

– Theresa May was succeeded by Boris Johnson. She remains in the House of Commons as
a backbencher (= député sans porte-feuille ministériel à la chambre des communes).
– Boris Johnson still could not get Parliament to approve a revised withdrawal agreement by
the end of October 2019 and chose to call for a snap election.9 The House of Commons set the
election date for 12 December 2019. Johnson needed to obtain an overall majority in the
election in order to accomplish his main goal of taking the United Kingdom out of
the European Union by the end of January 2020. There is now a transition period until the
end of 2020 while the UK and EU negotiate additional arrangements. The current rules on
trade, travel, and business for the UK and EU will continue to apply during the
transition period. New rules will take effect on 1 January 2021.

6
The Conservatives previously had a majority of 331 seats in the House of Commons. They needed to win at
least 326.
7
èCivilisation – A hung Parliament occurs when no party has won a majority of the seats in the House of
Commons. That means that no party has a clear and outright (= complete) mandate to form the new government.
For Theresa May to stay in power she formed a minority government (because her own party has no majority)
with the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland). Despite being still prime minister, her position is
precarious. Theresa May called for this general snap election because she thought her Conservative Party would
win handily (= easily). It did not.
8
èCivilisation – The Chequers Agreement dealt with the Future Relationship between the United Kingdom
and the European Union. It was nicknamed (= surnommé) the Chequers plan because it was agreed by the
Cabinet at Chequers, the PM’s country residence but finally rejected by Parliament.
9
The next general election was due to take place in 2022, but Theresa May’s resignation and Johnson’s
appointment as PM led to the snap election of December 12, 2019.

5
– The election resulted in a Conservative landslide majority (= majorité écrasante) win of
80 seats, their largest majority since 1987, with the party making a net gain of 48 seats and
winning 43.6% of the vote — the highest percentage by any party since 1979.

– On 23 January 2020, Parliament finally ratified the agreement by passing

the Withdrawal Agreement Act. It received the Royal Assent. The treaty will now be
taken to London for signing by Boris Johnson before it is returned to Brussels, where MEPs
will vote on the deal.

– The withdrawal agreement provides for a transition period until 31 December 2020,
during which the UK remains in the single market, in order to ensure frictionless trade until a
long-term relationship is agreed. However, as of January 2020, the latter remains subject of
negotiations yet to come.

If no such agreement is reached by that date and the transition period is not extended, a no-
deal Brexit would remain the default outcome in 2021.10

THREE ARMS OF THE STATE

– The British political system is headed by a monarchy but essentially the powers of the
monarch as head of state - currently Queen Elizabeth II11 - are ceremonial.

– The Queen’s most important practical power is the choice of the Member of Parliament
to form a government, but invariably the monarch follows the convention that this
opportunity is granted to the leader of the political party with the most seats in the House
of Commons.

– Although any remaining powers of the monarchy are largely ceremonial, the Royal
Family does have some subtle and hidden influence on the legislative process because of a
little-known provision that senior royals - notably the Queen and her eldest son Prince
Charles – the Prince of Wales - have to be consulted about legislation that might affect their
private interests and given the opportunity to have such legislation amended.

– Succession to the throne was largely governed by male-preference primogeniture, under

which sons inherit before daughters, and elder children inherit before younger ones of the
same gender. In 2011 the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron,

10
SEE Fiche de civilisation – What is Brexit?
11
SEE Fiche de civilisation – The British Monarchy.

6
announced at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting that all
16 Commonwealth realms12, including the United Kingdom, had agreed to abolish the
gender-preference rule for anyone born after the date of the meeting, 28 October 2011.
They also agreed that future monarchs would no longer be prohibited from marrying a Roman
Catholic – a law which dated from the Act of Settlement 1701.13 However, since the
monarch is also the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, the law which
prohibits a Roman Catholic from acceding to the throne remains. The necessary UK
legislation making the changes received the royal assent on 25 April 2013 and was brought
into force in March 2015 after the equivalent legislation was approved in all the other
Commonwealth realms. The Act is referred to as The Succession to the Crown Act (2013).

– In classical political theory, there are three arms of the state:

• The executive
The Prime Minister and Ministers who run the country and propose new laws.
• The legislature (= Assemblée)
The elected body that passes new laws.
• The judiciary:
The judges and the courts that ensure that everyone obeys the laws.

NB: In the political system of the United States, the constitution provides that there must be
a strict separate of powers of these three arms of the state, so that no individual can be a
member of more than one. So, for example, the US President is not and cannot be a member
of the Congress. This concept is called 'separation of powers', a term coined by the French
political, enlightenment thinker Montesquieu.

This is not the case in the UK:

• All Ministers in the government are either Members of Parliament = MPs (=

members of the elected assembly = The lower house of parliament = The House of
Commons or members of the unelected assembly = The upper house of
parliament = The House of Lords).
• Some very senior judges sit in the The House of Lords.
• The Lord Chancellor is one of the most ancient offices of state, dating back many
centuries. The Lord Chancellor is appointed by the Monarch on the advice of the

12
SEE Fiche de civilisation – The Commonwealth of nations.
13
SEE Fiche de civilisation – The Bill of Rights (1689), Magna Carta (1215) and the Act of settlement (1701).

7
 Prime Minister and is a senior member of the Cabinet. The Lord Chancellor heads
the Ministry of Justice as the Secretary of State for Justice. Previously the Lord
Chancellor also acted as Speaker of the House of Lords. The Lord Chancellor was
also head of the judiciary and the senior judge of the House of Lords in its judicial
capacity. However, under the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, the Lord
Chancellor ceased to be the Speaker of the Lords and was replaced by the Lord
Speaker and the Lord Chief Justice14 is now head of the judiciary. The Lord
Chancellor may no longer sit as a judge.

The U.K. Government15

– As we’ve just said, all Government Ministers have to be a member of either the House
of Commons (most of them) or the House of Lords (the remainder of them) and every
Government Department will have at least one Minister in the Lords, so that the
Department can speak in either House as necessary.
– The number of Ministers varies from administration to administration, but typically there
will be around 120 - the 20 or so most senior ministers being Cabinet Ministers. The
Ministerial and Other Salaries Act, passed in 1975, limits prime ministers to 109 ministerial
salaries being paid at any one time with a maximum of 95 ministers in the House of
Commons.
– Historically most British governments have been composed of ministers from a single
political party, which had an overall majority of seats in the House of Commons - the 'first-
past-the-post' (FPTP) electoral system greatly facilitates and indeed promotes this outcome.
However, occasionally there have been minority governments or coalition governments.
– From May 2010 till May 2015, the UK had its first coalition government in 65 years.
The Conservatives (led by David Cameron) went into coalition with the Liberal
Democrats (led by Nick Clegg) because in the General Election they did not secure a
majority of the seats. In this coalition, the Lib Dems had 17 ministers led by the Deputy
Prime Minister Nick Clegg.
– On May 7, 2015, David Cameron (Conservative) won an outright majority and no
Coalition government was then necessary (all Ministers coming from the same party – the

14
The Lord Chief Justice is the Head of the Judiciary of England and Wales and also the President of the Courts
of England and Wales and responsible for representing the views of the judiciary to Parliament and the
Government.
15
See Fiche de civilisation: Political Parties in the UK.

8
Conservative Party) but after the result of the referendum on Brexit in June 2016 David
Cameron resigned. Theresa May was appointed prime minister by the Conservative party to
replace him.

– In June 2017, Theresa May called an early election (= a snap election) to be elected
prime minister and comfort her position on Brexit. With not enough seats to control the
House of Commons16 – but still remaining the largest party in the House - she faced a hung
Parliament17. The Conservative Party then formed a minority government and signed a
“confidence and supply” agreement with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

– Theresa May survived a vote of no confidence from Conservative MPs in December 2018
and a Parliamentary vote of no confidence in January 2019. She carried out the Brexit
negotiations with the European Union, adhering to the Chequers Agreement 18 , which
resulted in the Brexit withdrawal agreement. After versions of this agreement were rejected
by Parliament three times, she resigned on July 24, 2019.

– Theresa May was succeeded by Boris Johnson. She remains in the House of Commons as
a backbencher (= député sans porte-feuille ministériel à la chambre des communes).

– Boris Johnson still could not get Parliament to approve a revised withdrawal agreement by
the end of October 2019 and chose to call for a snap election.19 The House of Commons set
the election date for 12 December 2019. Johnson needed to obtain an overall majority in the
election in order to accomplish his main goal of taking the United Kingdom out of
the European Union by the end of January 2020.

– The election resulted in a Conservative landslide majority (= majorité écrasante) win of

80 seats, their largest majority since 1987, with the party making a net gain of 48 seats and
winning 43.6% of the vote — the highest percentage by any party since 1979.

16
The Conservatives previously had a majority of 331 seats in the House of Commons. They needed to win at
least 326.
17
èCivilisation – A hung Parliament occurs when no party has won a majority of the seats in the House of
Commons. That means that no party has a clear and outright (= complete) mandate to form the new government.
For Theresa May to stay in power she formed a minority government (because her own party has no majority)
with the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland). Despite being still prime minister, her position is
precarious. Theresa May called for this general snap election because she thought her Conservative Party would
win handily (= easily). It did not.
18
èCivilisation – The Chequers Agreement dealt with the Future Relationship between the United Kingdom
and the European Union. It was nicknamed (= surnommé) the Chequers plan because it was agreed by the
Cabinet at Chequers, the PM’s country residence but finally rejected by Parliament.
19
The next general election was due to take place in 2022, but Theresa May’s resignation and Johnson’s
appointment as PM led to the snap election of December 12, 2019.

9
The Prime Minister (The PM)

– The UK does not have a President. Constitutionally the head of state is the monarch who
is a hereditary member of the Royal Family. However, the monarch has very few formal
powers and stays above party politics. So, in practice, the most important person in the British
political system is the Prime Minister. The first modern Prime Minister was Sir Robert
Walpole who served from 1721-1742, so PM David Cameron was the 54th and youngest
PM since 1812, a few months younger than when Tony Blair became PM in 1997.
– In theory, the Prime Minister simply choses the ministers who run Government departments
and chairs (= presides over) the Cabinet – the collection of the most senior of those Ministers.
In practice, however, the Prime Minister is a very powerful figure and increasingly has been
behaving much like a president in other political systems, especially in the area of foreign
policy.
– The official residence of the prime minister is at 10 Downing Street.
– The official country residence of the British prime minister is Chequers: An estate (=
domaine) and country house (= maison de campagne) in South England, in
central Buckinghamshire.

Government Departments

The most important political Departments are called:

– The Treasury: In most countries, this would be called the Ministry of Finance. It is
responsible for the raising of all taxes and the control of all government expenditure plus the
general management of the economy. The head of the Treasury is called the Chancellor of
the Exchequer (= Chancelier de l’échiquier = minister britannique des finances) and is
currently Rishi Sunak who took office on February 13, 2020 – replacing Sajid Javid
(appointed on July 24, 2019) who, himself, had taken over from Philip Hammond who had
himself replaced George Osborne (who, on taking office, was the youngest Chancellor for
more than 180 years).

– The Home Office (HO): In most countries, this would be called the Ministry of the
Interior. It is responsible for criminal matters, policing, and immigration. The Head of the
Home Office is called the Home Secretary. Priti Patel (since July 24, 2019) is the current
Home Secretary.

10
– The Foreign (and Commonwealth) Office: In most countries, this would be called the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is responsible for all our international relationships,
especially our membership of the European Union. The head of the Foreign Office is called
the Foreign Secretary and is currently Simon Gerard McDonald (since July 24, 2019)
who took over from Jeremy Hunt who himself replaced Boris Johnson.

– Many other UK Government Departments are similar to those in other countries and cover
subjects such as education, health, transport, industry, and justice. However, there are
also departments for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

– The Department for Exiting the European Union: The Secretary of State Dominic Raab
replaced David Davis in July 2018 but resigned on 15 November 2018 over the draft
withdrawal agreement. His replacement was announced on 16 November 2018 to be Stephen
Barclay. The Department for Exiting the European Union will be wound up (= closed)
after January 31, 2020 once the UK leaves the EU bloc.

– When talking about the British Government, the media will often use the term Whitehall
because a number of Government Departments are located along a central London street very
close to Parliament called Whitehall.

Government Ministers

– All Government Departments are run by Ministers who are either Members of the House
of Commons or Members of the House of Lords.

There are three classes of Minister:

Secretary of State - This is usually the head of a Department.
Minister of State - This is a middle-ranking minister.
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State - This is the most junior class of minister.

– The Prime Minister and all the Secretaries of State together comprise an executive body
of government called the Cabinet. The Cabinet meets usually once a week on Tuesday
morning. Cabinet meetings are confidential and all members are bound by any decision that it
takes in a practice called collective responsibility. An extensive system of Cabinet
Committees considers matters either before they go to Cabinet or (more usually) instead of
them going to Cabinet.

11
– Although all Ministers are appointed by the Prime Minister and report to him, ultimately
all Ministers are accountable to (= responsible to = answerable to = responsables devant)
Parliament:
– About once a month, they have to face questions in the House of Commons about the work
of the Department.
– Each government department has a special committee of the House of Commons, which
watches the work of that Department.
– Any government initiative or important statement concerning a Department must be the
subject of an appearance in the House of Commons by a minister from that Department.

The British civil service

– Each Secretary of State is able to appoint a couple of political advisers – formally

known as Special Advisers – to serve him or her. But Special Advisers are simply advisers.
They have no line management responsibilities in respect of the staff of the Department.
Besides the tiny number of Special Advisers, Government Departments is run by civil
servants (= fonctionnaires) who are recruited in a totally open manner and serve governments
of any political parties. The independence and professional of the British civil service is a
fundamental feature of the British political system.

The U.K. Parliament20

– The British Parliament is often called Westminster because it is housed in a distinguished

building in central London called the Palace of Westminster. The British Parliament - like
most in the world - is bicameral, that is there are two houses or chambers. The only
exceptions to this practice around the world are some small countries such as Finland, Israel
and New Zealand.

The House of Commons

– This is the lower chamber but the one with the most authority. The House of Commons
sits each weekday for about half of the weeks of the year.

– The Commons is chaired by the Speaker. Unlike the Speaker in the US House of
Representatives, the post is non-political and indeed, by convention, the political parties do

20
See Fiche de civilisation : Devolution in the UK.

12
not contest the Parliamentary constituency held by the Speaker. The current Speaker, Sir
Lindsay Hoyle, was elected Speaker on 4 November 2019, following the resignation of John
Bercow.21
– The Leader of the House of Commons is generally a member of the Cabinet of the United
Kingdom who is responsible for arranging government business in the House of Commons.
The current incumbent is Jacob Rees-Mogg (since July 24, 2019).

– The House of Commons currently comprises 650 Members of Parliament or MPs (the
number varies slightly from time to time to reflect population change). This is a large
legislature (= house, assembly) by international standards. For instance, the House of
Representatives in the USA has 435 seats but, of course, each of the 50 US states has its
own legislature.

– Before the 2010 General Election, the Conservative Party said that it wished to reduce the
number of Commons seats by around 10% (65 seats) and the Liberal Democrats said that the
Commons should be reduced by 150 MPs. The new Coalition Government announced that it
planned legislation to reduce the number from 650 to 600 as part of a wider change to the
number and size of constituencies, but Parliament blocked the process of redrawing
boundaries that is necessary before a General Election can be held with fewer seats.

– There is insufficient seating capacity in the House of Commons for all the MPs. Members
do not sit at desks but on long, green-covered benches and there is only seating capacity for
437 MPs out of the total of 650...

– Each member in the House of Commons represents a geographical constituency (=

circonscription). Typically a constituency would have around 60,000-80,000 voters,
depending mainly on whether it is an urban or rural constituency. The largest constituency in
the country is the Isle of Wight with 108,253 electors (= voters), while the smallest is Na h-
Eileanan an Iar (formerly known as the Western Isles) with an electorate of only 21,884.
Governments sometimes intend to make the size of constituencies more equal in terms of
electors (= voters).

– Every citizen aged 18 or over can vote once in the constituency in which they live. Voting
is not compulsory. In the 2010 general election 65% of the electorate actually voted; in the
general election of June 2017, 68,7% voted; in the December 12, 2019 general election,

21
èCivilisation: In practice, the Speaker - notionally Conservative - is not counted against any political party
because he is required to be neutral.

13
67,3% voted. Most democratic countries use a method of election called proportional
representation, which means that there is a reasonable correlation between the percentage of
votes cast for a particular political party and the number of seats or representatives won by
that party. However, much of the Anglo-Saxon world – the USA, Canada, and the UK but not
Australia or New Zealand – uses a method of election called the simple majority system or
'first past the post'. In this system, the country is divided into a number of constituencies
each with a single member and the party that wins the largest number of votes in each
constituency wins that constituency regardless of the proportion of the vote secured. The
simple majority system of election tends to under-represent less successful political parties
and to maximise the chance of the most popular political party winning a majority of seats
nationwide even if it does not win a majority of the votes nationwide.

– In the UK, unlike many countries, there are not fixed term parliaments. A general election,
that is to say, a nationwide election for all 650 seats – is held when the Prime Minister calls
it, but the election cannot be more than 5 years after the last one and it is usually around
four years after the last one. The 2010-2015 Coalition Government passed the legislation in
2011 (The Fixed Term Parliaments Act) providing for fixed five-year parliaments which
implies that the next General Election should have been in May 2020. The Cameron-Clegg
coalition22 did it to “underpin its stability by making it hard for either party to bring the
government down and force another election”. The law frustrated three attempts by Boris
Johnson in 2019 to call a general election on his own terms as it requires two-thirds of MPs.
If the act is abolished, Johnson will have the power to call an election whenever he chooses.

• The 2010 General Election was held in May 2010 and the result was as follows:

Conservative Party: 306 seats (up 97) with a voting share of 36.1% (up 3.8%)
Labour Party: 258 seats (down 91) with a voting share of 29.0% (down 6.2%)
Liberal Democrat Party: 57 seats (down 5) with a voting share of 23.0% (up 1.0%)
Other parties: 28 seats (down 3) with a voting share of 11.9% (down 1.4%)
Total turnout nationwide (= participation électorale) was 65.1% up 3.7% on 2005.

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èCivilisation – The Cameron-Clegg Coalition government: The 2010 general election resulted in a hung
parliament (Britain's first for 36 years), and the Conservatives, led by David Cameron, which had won the
largest number of seats, formed a coalition with the Liberal Democrats and Nick Clegg in order to gain a
parliamentary majority, ending 13 years of Labour government. This was the first time that the Conservatives
and Lib Dems had made a power-sharing deal at Westminster. It was also the first full coalition in Britain since
1945, having been formed 70 years virtually to the day after the establishment of Winston Churchill's wartime
coalition.

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 • The 2015 General Election was on May 7, 2015 and the result was as follows:

Conservative Party: 331 seats (up 24) with 36.9% of the vote
Labour Party: 232 seats (down 26) with 30.4% of the vote
Scottish National Party: 56 seats (up 48) with 4.7% of the vote
Liberal Democrat Party: 8 seats (down 49) with 7.9% of the vote
Other parties: 23 seats (down 3) with 20.1% of the vote
Total turnout nationwide was 66.1% up 1.0% on 2010.

• The 2017 General Election was on June 9, 2017 and the result was as follows:

Conservative Party: 318 seats (down 13) with a voting share of 42.4% (up 5,5%)
Labour Party: 262 seats (91) with a voting share of 40.0% (up 9.5%)
Scottish National Party: 35 seats (down 21) with 3.0% of the vote (down 1,7%)
Liberal Democrat Party: 57 seats (down 5) with a voting share of 23.0% (down 1.7%)
DUP: 10 seats (up 3) with a voting share of 0.9% (up 0.3%)
Total turnout nationwide (= participation électorale) was 68.7% down 2.6% on 2015.

• The 2019 General Election was on December 12, 2019 and the result was as
follows:

– The election resulted in a Conservative landslide majority (= majorité écrasante) win of

80 seats, their largest majority since 1987, with the party making a net gain of 48 seats and
winning 43.6% of the vote — the highest percentage by any party since 1979. In England,
the Conservatives won 345 out of 533 seats. Many Conservative gains were made at the
expense of the Labour Party in the latter's long-time stronghold in Northern England, known
as the 'red wall'. Many of these seats had not had a Conservative MP in decades, if ever, but
registered a strong 'Leave' vote in the 2016 EU referendum.
– The Labour Party won 202 seats, making it their worst result since the 1935 general
election (in terms of the number of seats).
– The Scottish National Party (SNP) made a net gain of 13.
– The Liberal Democrats improved their vote share to 11.6% but won only 11 seats, a net
loss of one since the last election.

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– The result of the December 12, 2019 election saw the Conservatives strengthening
their position on Brexit, with Johnson securing a mandate to ensure the UK's departure
from the European Union (EU) on 31 January 2020.

– Labour's defeat led to Jeremy Corbyn announcing his intention to resign, triggering
a leadership election. On 2 April 2020 Jeremy Corbyn agreed to step down after Labour
lost 59 seats in the 12 December general election, handing PM Boris Johnson’s
Conservatives a big parliamentary majority. Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer,
won with 56.2 per cent of the vote by party members and supporters

— For Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, lost her seat in the general election held on 12
December 2019, thus ceasing to be leader; deputy leader Ed Davey and Party President Sal
Brinton became acting co-leaders. Brinton was replaced by Mark Pack following his
assuming the office of Party President on 1 January 2020. In August 2020, the Liberal
Democrats elected Sir Ed Davey as their new leader

– For the SNP leader, Nicola Sturgeon, her party's success led to renewed hope for a second
independence referendum, to which the Conservative Party had expressed its opposition
before the election.
– In Northern Ireland, nationalist MPs outnumbered unionist ones for the first time.
Total turnout nationwide (= participation électorale) was 67,3% down 1.5% on 2017.

The House of Lords

– This is the upper chamber but the one with less authority. Its main roles are to revise
legislation and keep a check on Government by scrutinising its activities.

– Since the Parliament Acts of 1911 and 1949, its power to block "money bills" is limited
to one month and its power to block other bills is limited to one session (= one year), so
ultimately it cannot block the will of the House of Commons.

– The House of Lords is an institution that has no parallel anywhere in the democratic world.
Indeed, the only other country with an unelected second chamber is Lesotho. The
explanation for the unusual nature of the Lords goes back to the British political system which
has evolved very slowly and peacefully, and it is not totally logical or democratic.

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– There is no fixed number of members in the House of Lords. Currently, there are 794
members in the House of Lords (not including 16 peers who are on leave of absence or are
otherwise disqualified from sitting), unlike the House of Commons, which has a 650-seat
fixed membership. The number was actually halved to 666 in the reforms of 1999 but since
then, successive Prime Ministers have been adding new life peers (more than 100) – it is
much faster than members are dying.

– Ironically, the size of the House of Lords continues to rise at the same time as the House of
Commons has legislated to reduce its size.

– Historically most members of the House of Lords have been what we called temporal
hereditary peers (= Lords Temporal). This means that decades ago, a king or queen
nominated a member of the aristocracy to be a member of the House and, since then, the right
to sit in the House has passed through the family from generation to generation. Seen as
undemocratic, the last Labour government (1997-2010) under the House of Lords Act
(1999) abolished the right of all but (= except) 92 of these hereditary peers to sit in the
House. Since 2008, only one of them is female (Countess of Mar). Most hereditary peerages
can be inherited only by men.

– Almost all the other members of today's House of Lords are what we call temporal life
peers. This means that they have been chosen by the Queen on the advice of the
Government, to sit in the House for as long as they live, but afterwards no member of
their family has the right to sit in the House. Many are former senior politicians. Others are
very distinguished figures in fields such as education, health and social policy. Mrs Thatcher
became Lady Thatcher and temporal life peeress of the House of Lords when she was
appointed Baroness of Kesteven23 by queen Elizabeth II.

– A small number of other members - 26 - are Lords Spiritual: Bishops (= Évêques) of the
established Church of England24. The archbishops of Canterbury and York and the
bishops of London, Durham and Winchester automatically take seats in the Lords, while
the further 21 seats are allocated on the basis of length of service.

– Around two-thirds of peers were aged over 65 and 15% were aged over 80. There is no
retirement age.

23
èCivilisation – Kesteven is a region in Lancashire, which includes Lady Thatcher’s hometown of Grantham.
24
èCivilisation – The Church of Scotland, which is Presbyterian, and the Anglican churches
in Wales and Northern Ireland, which are no longer established churches, are not represented. As we
mentioned, the Lords Spiritual are distinct from the Lords Temporal, their secular counterparts who also sit in
the House of Lords.

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– There is nowhere near sufficient seating capacity in the chamber of the House of Lords for
all the peers. Members do not sit at desks but on long, red-covered benches and there is only
seating capacity for 230 peers out of the total of 794. Even on a 'whipped' vote25, a couple of
hundred peers will not turn up.

– The House of Lords reform is unfinished business. The Parliament Act of 1911 first
raised the prospect of an elected upper house but it has still not happened. There is a cross-
party consensus that it should become a mainly elected body – in the form of a Senate -
although there is as yet no agreement on the details of the next stage of reform.

Some distinguishing features of the British Parliamentary system:

> Much of the work of Parliament is done in Committees rather than on the floor of the
chamber.

The House of Commons has two types of committee:

– Select Committees are appointed for the lifetime of a Parliament; 'shadow' the work of a
particular Government Department; conduct investigations, receive written and oral evidence,
and issue reports. Membership is made up only of backbenchers MPs (= députés sans
portefeuille ministériel) and reflects proportionately the balance of the parties in the
Commons.

– General Committees (previously known as Standing Committees) are temporary bodies -

most of them Public Bill Committees formed to examine the detail of a particular piece of
proposed legislation and consider amendments to the Bill. Membership includes Government
and Opposition spokespersons on the subject matter of the Bill and overall membership
reflects proportionately the balance of the parties in the Commons.

The House of Lords only has Select Committees (it does not need Standing Committees
because the details of Bills are considered on the floor of the chamber).

Finally there are some Joint Committees of the Commons and the Lords.

> Discussion and debate involve quite a gladiatorial or confrontational approach. This is
reflected in the physical shape of the chambers. Whereas most legislatures are semi-circular,

25
èCivilisation – Whips are MPs or members of the House of Lords appointed by each party to inform and
organise their own members in Parliament. One of their responsibilities is to make sure that their members vote
in divisions, and vote in line with party policy. It is the party whips, along with the Leader and Shadow (=
Opposition) Leaders of each House, that negotiate behind the scenes to arrange the day to day business in
Parliament - a process often referred to as 'the usual channels'. The Chief Whip of a party is a senior position
and they are usually involved in top-level party discussions.

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both the House of Commons and the House of Lords are rectangular with the Government
party sitting on one side and the Opposition parties sitting on the other side. The House of
Lords alone has cross-benches for independent peers.26 It is quite normal for speakers in
debates to be interrupted by other members, especially of another party, and, in the
Commons, cheering and jeering (= encouragement et moquerie) is a regular occurrence.

> In the Commons, there is a Prime Minister's Question (PMQ) Time for 30 minutes at 12
noon every Wednesday. Questions can be asked on any subject. This is frequently a heated
affair with the Leader of the Opposition trying to embarrass the Prime Minister and it is the
one part of the week's proceedings guaranteed to attract the interest of the media. In his book
"A Journey", former Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote: "PMQs was the most nerve-wracking,
discombobulating27, nail-biting, bowel-moving, terror-inspiring, courage-draining experience
in my prime ministerial life, without question."

> The Government is normally assured of a majority in the House of Commons for any
measure or vote. This is mainly because in the Commons there is a strong 'whipping' system
in which political parties tell their members how to vote on every significant division though
a weekly set of instructions. The importance of actually being present to vote in the manner
instructed depends on whether the 'whip' is one-line, two-line or - the most serious - three-
line. Even when there is a rebellion by members of the majority party, the Government
usually obtains its wish because all Ministers and their Parliamentary Private Secretaries
(PPSs) are required to vote for the Government or resign their Ministerial or PPS position.
This is called 'the payroll vote' (although PPS are not actually paid to be a PPS) and
currently around 120 MPs or 22% of the Commons make up this block vote.

> The official record of the proceedings of the Commons and the Lords is called Hansard.
The press and broadcasters are present all the time and live audio and visual broadcasting can
take place at any time.

26
Crossbenchers = Members of the House of Lords who do not belong to any particular political party.
27
Discombobulate = Make sb very confused.

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The Legislative Process

– In the British political system, almost all legislation is proposed by the Government and
much of it comes from promises made in the manifesto of the relevant political party at the
last election. -

– At the beginning of each annual session of the Parliament, the main Bills to be considered
are announced by the Queen in a speech opening that year's session of Parliament (= The
Queen’s Speech).

– All legislation has to be approved by both Houses of Parliament.

– In each House of Parliament, a proposed piece of legislation - called a Bill (= projet de loi) -
goes through the following stages:
• First Reading – the Bill is introduced with simply a reading by a Minister of the long
title of the Bill (= the formal title appearing at the head of legislative instruments).
• Second Reading – the general principles of the Bill are debated by all the members of
the House and a formal vote is taken.
• Committee Stage – each clause and schedule of the Bill, plus amendments to them
and any new clauses or schedules, is examined in detail, in the Commons by a small,
specially chosen group of members meeting as Public Bill Committee, in the Lords
by the members as a whole on the floor of the House.
• Report Stage – the changes made to the Bill in the Committee are reported to and
debated by the whole House which is invited to consider the Bill as a whole, approve
the changes by the Committee, and consider any further proposed changes that might
be suggested.
• Third Reading – the final version of the Bill is considered by the whole House in a
short debate (in the Commons without the facility for further amendments).
• Royal Assent - the Crown gives assent to the Bill which then becomes an Act of
Parliament, the provisions becoming law either immediately or at a date specified in
the Act or at a date specified by what is called a Commencement Order.

Several points are worth noting about the legislative process:

– Under normal circumstances, all these stages must be completed in both Houses in one
session of Parliament; otherwise the process must begin all over again.

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– Debates on most Bills are timetabled through a programme motion (when Government and
Opposition agree) or an allocation of time motion which is popularly known as a 'guillotine'
motion (when Government and Opposition do not agree).
– As well almost all legislation coming from the Government, almost all successful
amendments originate from the Government.

— As we said earlier, The House of Lords has much more limited legislative powers than
the House of Commons. Money Bills can only be initiated in the Commons and the Lords
can only reject legislation from the Commons for one year. Furthermore, there is a convention
– called the Salisbury Convention - that the Lords does not block legislature in fulfilment of
the election manifesto of the elected Government.

The UK Judiciary

– The British judicial branch is extremely complex. Unlike most countries which operate a
single system of law, the UK operates three separate legal systems: one for England and
Wales, one for Scotland, and one for Northern Ireland. Although bound by similar principles,
these systems differ in form and the manner of operation. Currently a process of reform is in
operation.

> The Lord Chancellor's office - which for 1,400 years maintained the judiciary - has now
been replaced by the Ministry for Justice, which administers the court system. A Judicial
Appointments Commission has been set up to advise the head of Ministry for Justice (=
the MoJ) on the appointment of new judges.

> The Appellate Committee of the House of Lords - previously the Highest Court in the
land - was, by way of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, replaced by the Supreme Court
in October 2009 to allow the judiciary to operate in total independence from the
Government. The Supreme Court is now the ultimate court of appeal in all legal matters other
than criminal cases in Scotland. It consists of 12 judges and sits in the Middlesex Guildhall
in Parliament Square.

– Since 1951 the UK has been a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights
(part of the Council of Europe) and since 1966 it has allowed its citizens the right of
individual petition enabling them to take the government to the European Court of Human
Rights in Strasbourg. The Blair Government incorporated the provisions of the European

21
Convention in UK domestic law in 2000 so that citizens can now seek to have the provisions
enforced in domestic courts.

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