Constitutional framework <\/p>\n
The United Kingdom is a constitutional<\/a> monarchy<\/a> and a parliamentary democracy<\/a>. The country\u2019s head of state is the reigning king or queen, and the head of government<\/a> is the prime minister<\/a>, who is the leader of the majority political party<\/a> in the House of Commons<\/a>.<\/p>\n The British constitution is uncodified; it is only partly written and is flexible. Its basic sources are parliamentary and European Union<\/a> legislation, the European Convention on Human Rights<\/a>, and decisions by courts of law. Matters for which there is no formal law, such as the resignation of office by a government, follow precedents (conventions) that are open to development or modification. Works of authority, such as Albert Venn Dicey<\/a>\u2019s Lectures Introductory to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (1885), are also considered part of the constitution.<\/p>\n House of Commons<\/a>Chamber of the House of Commons in the Houses of Parliament, London.(more)<\/p>\n The main elements of the government are the legislature, the executive<\/a>, and the judiciary. There is some overlap between the branches, as there is no formal separation of powers<\/a> or system of checks and balances<\/a>. For example, the lord chancellor<\/a> traditionally was a member of all three branches, serving as a member of the cabinet (executive branch), as the government\u2019s leader in the House of Lords (legislative branch), and as the head of the country\u2019s judiciary<\/a> (judicial branch). However, constitutional reforms enacted in 2005 (and entering into force in 2006) stripped the office of most of its legislative and judicial functions, with those powers devolving to the lord speaker and the lord chief justice<\/a>, respectively. That reform also created the Supreme Court, which in October 2009 replaced the Appellate Committee of the House of Lords as the venue<\/a> of last resort in the British legal system.<\/p>\n Sovereignty<\/a> resides in Parliament<\/a>, which comprises<\/a> the monarch, the mainly appointive House of Lords<\/a>, and the elected House of Commons<\/a>. The sovereignty of Parliament is expressed in its legislative enactments, which are binding on all, though individuals may contest in the courts the legality of any action under a specific statute. In certain circumstances individuals may also seek protection under European law<\/a>. Until 1999 the House of Lords consisted mainly of hereditary peers<\/a> (or nobles). Since then it has comprised<\/a> mainly appointed peers, selected by successive prime ministers to serve for life. As of March 2016, of 815 lords<\/a>, 701 were life peers, 88 were hereditary peers, and another 26 were archbishops and bishops. Each of the 650 members of the House of Commons (members of Parliament; MPs) represents an individual constituency<\/a> (district) by virtue of winning a plurality of votes in the constituency<\/a>.<\/p>\n All political power rests with the prime minister<\/a> and the cabinet<\/a>, and the monarch must act on their advice. The prime minister chooses the cabinet from MPs in his political party. Most cabinet ministers are heads of government departments. The prime minister\u2019s authority grew during the 20th century, and, alone or with one or two colleagues, the prime minister increasingly has made decisions previously made by the cabinet as a whole. Prime ministers have nevertheless been overruled by the cabinet on many occasions and must generally have its support to exercise their powers.<\/p>\n Because the party with a majority in the House of Commons supports the cabinet, it exercises the sovereignty of Parliament. The royal right of veto has not been exercised since the early 18th century, and the legislative power of the House of Lords was reduced in 1911 to the right to delay legislation. The cabinet plans and lays before Parliament all important bills. Although the cabinet thus controls the lawmaking machinery, it is also subject to Parliament; it must expound and defend its policy in debate, and its continuation in office depends on the support of the House of Commons.<\/p>\n The executive apparatus, the cabinet secretariat, was developed after World War I<\/a> and carries out the cabinet\u2019s decisions. It also prepares the cabinet\u2019s agenda, records its conclusions, and communicates them to the government departments that implement<\/a> them.<\/p>\n Regional government <\/p>\n Within the United Kingdom, national assemblies in Scotland, Wales<\/a>, and Northern Ireland took power in 1999 and assumed some powers previously held exclusively by the central Parliament at Westminster, to which they remain subordinate. The central Parliament retains full legislative and executive control over England, which lacks a separate regional assembly.<\/p>\n Scotland\u2019s Parliament has wide powers over such matters as health, education, housing, transport, the environment<\/a>, and agriculture. It also has the power to increase or decrease the British income tax rate within Scotland by up to three percentage points. The central Parliament retains responsibility for foreign affairs, defense, social security<\/a>, and overall economic policy<\/a>. Unlike the members of the House of Commons, members of the Scottish Parliament are chosen under a system of proportional representation<\/a>. Scotland<\/a> has a distinct legal system based on Roman law<\/a>. In 2011 the Scottish National Party<\/a> formed Scotland\u2019s first majority government, which pledged an independence forum<\/a> by 2015.<\/p>\n Since 1999 Wales has also had its own assembly, but only in 2011 did that National Assembly<\/a> gain direct lawmaking power. It broadly administers the same services as the Scottish Parliament. Like Scottish legislators, members of the Welsh assembly are elected by proportional representation.<\/p>\n The Northern Ireland<\/a> Assembly gained limited legislative and executive power at the end of 1999. Its members, like those of the other regional assemblies, are elected by proportional representation. It has power over matters concerning agriculture<\/a>, economic development, education, the environment, health, and social services, but the Westminster government retains control over foreign affairs, defense, general economic policy, taxation, policing, and criminal justice<\/a>. Divisions between unionist (Protestant<\/a>) and nationalist (Roman Catholic) factions<\/a> in the Northern Ireland Assembly, however, have threatened its future. If either faction withdraws from the assembly, the region could return to the system of direct rule by the central government that prevailed in Northern Ireland from 1973 to 1999.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Constitutional framework The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary democracy. The country\u2019s head of state…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72119,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[233,36481,36480,36479,59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-72259","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-article","9":"tag-britannica","10":"tag-encyclopeadia","11":"tag-encyclopedia","12":"tag-gb","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-greatbritain","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}