Democracy in the UK

Originally posted by Zepherian
Because of democratic resistance against aristocracy you get conspiracies. England is perhaps the country on earth that best ilustrates the elitist struggle to keep power and influence over an ever more educated populace. It's a dynamic tension. And btw, it's not just the power to claim land, the monarch has a whole host of others, right up to the emission of currency, powers which parallel the parliment.

This maybe true. But would a Monarch of Britian ever do it? Everytime an abosolute Monarch came to power the country rose up. The glorious Revolution (1688) and the English civil war to name but two.

If I could clarify some points.

We don't vote for the Prime Minister, or even a Party, really. Political Parties are not recognised hy Parliament. You vote for your candidate in your constituency. It's the candidates themselves that organise themselves into parties of like minded individuals.

Now, as for the Prime Minister. Whoever can command the majority of MP's in parliament can then go to the Queen and request that they be allowed to form a Government.

It has nothing really to do with what party your from. If Labour MP's supported a Liberal MP as PM, then that situation is allowed. Obviously this would never happen, as the party whips would never allow it, but it is conceivable in theory. Interestingly, party whips are not really recognised by parliament either. The behaviour of political parties within parliament is at odds with how it should operate.

This in itself could be interesting at the next election, depending on the outcome, as one party alone may not command a majority enough to form a Government, so anyone within parliament, be it the Commons or Lords, could form a Government providing they had the support of the majority of MP's.

You could get a coaltion of cross party MP's form a Government, without involving any of the Parliamentary party leaders, provided they could demonstarte they had majority support across all MP's. That would be worth a giggle to see, although not likely to happen as most MP's are sheep led by promises of jobs and peerages.

EDIT: I find it funny that people will complain about "being undemocratic" or "losing their rights" without actually knowing much about them in the first place. We need more people to take an interest in things and know their rights. Some members of the Labour party even claim we don't even have a constitution, but we do!

In fact, I used my rights as Guaranteed under the Bill of rights only the other day to avoid paying a fine that some trumped up train inspector tried to issue.

Instead of moaning about something, yet not knowing about that which you moan, go out and learn exactly how things work and educate yourself! Apathy is killing this country much more than some porridge faced Scot in Downing Street. After all, apathy is how the Labour party got into power in the first place. In the last election, only 27% of the registered electorate voted for them in the popular vote, yet they control parliament with a huge majority....

I could go on for hours, but I don't wish to go off on one in case nobody is interested.

[edit on 28/8/08 by stumason]

The Labour Party won the vote fair and square, and they can hold the general election anytime they want within the five years that they are in power. The next one must be held by 2010 I believe. The party in power have the right to put forward any candidate they please as Prime Minister and therefore I do not see what you are complaining about.

Originally posted by sayzaar
I believe that if a PM stands down, all that is needed is a vote by the party to elect a new one. Seems wrong i know, but that's how it is. But in the long term.it does'nt matter now anyway,as brown is giving the UK to Europe. Traitorous in my opinion.

Yeah but what chance do we really have when most of the people vote for one of the three main parties? Lib Dem/Con/Lab.
And the minority parties like UKIP, Green Party, BNP etc just get a slight percentage rise or fall in comparision. It seems the public are too stupid to realise they are falling for the same old spiel again and again. Seems they are too afraid to vote for something new? Anyone actually go on the British Democracy Forum?