House of Commons
The House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the UK parliament and has been the dominant chamber for over a century.
Parliamentary sovereignty- a central principle of the British Constitution gives parliament legislative supremacy. The parliament has the main say in laws.
Motion of no confidence- the House of Commons can bring down the government with a vote of no confidence. The result of this is that all of government must resign and parliament is dissolved. There have only been four occasions of this since 1895. The most recent was in 1979 when James Callaghan’s government was defeated in a motion of no confidence.
Composition
The House of Commons is a democratically elected chamber consisting of 650 members of parliament. Each MP is elected in single-member constituencies by FPTP. There can be adjustments made on the number of MPs.
In the chamber, the governing party of parties will sit to the right of the speaker with the cabinet ministers on the front bench. The shadow cabinet will sit opposite them on the front row with the various other MPs behind them. The MPs who sit behind the frontbenchers are known as backbenchers.
Almost all MPs are elected through representing a political party. Just 2 independent candidates were elected in 2005. In 2010 just one independent was voted into power.
Each party has whips who have various jobs:
1) To ensure that MPs attend parliamentary divisions (votes), or approve the vote of the MP when they cannot be present.
2) They also are there to tell MPs the way that they are expected to vote. These are known as whips and MPs get one of these every week. A ‘three-line’ whip is a strict instruction that they are expected to vote a certain way.
3) They finally are expected to enforce discipline within parliament. They make sure that wavering voters vote for their party through making threats, making offers and offering assurances. If they fail to vote the correct way they can be expelled from
The House of Commons is the lower house of the UK parliament and has been the dominant chamber for over a century.
Parliamentary sovereignty- a central principle of the British Constitution gives parliament legislative supremacy. The parliament has the main say in laws.
Motion of no confidence- the House of Commons can bring down the government with a vote of no confidence. The result of this is that all of government must resign and parliament is dissolved. There have only been four occasions of this since 1895. The most recent was in 1979 when James Callaghan’s government was defeated in a motion of no confidence.
Composition
The House of Commons is a democratically elected chamber consisting of 650 members of parliament. Each MP is elected in single-member constituencies by FPTP. There can be adjustments made on the number of MPs.
In the chamber, the governing party of parties will sit to the right of the speaker with the cabinet ministers on the front bench. The shadow cabinet will sit opposite them on the front row with the various other MPs behind them. The MPs who sit behind the frontbenchers are known as backbenchers.
Almost all MPs are elected through representing a political party. Just 2 independent candidates were elected in 2005. In 2010 just one independent was voted into power.
Each party has whips who have various jobs:
1) To ensure that MPs attend parliamentary divisions (votes), or approve the vote of the MP when they cannot be present.
2) They also are there to tell MPs the way that they are expected to vote. These are known as whips and MPs get one of these every week. A ‘three-line’ whip is a strict instruction that they are expected to vote a certain way.
3) They finally are expected to enforce discipline within parliament. They make sure that wavering voters vote for their party through making threats, making offers and offering assurances. If they fail to vote the correct way they can be expelled from