Government Of The United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly referred to as HM Government (HMG) or the British Government, is the central government of the United Kingdom.
The Government is led by the Prime Minister, who selects all the remaining Ministers. The Prime Minister and the other most senior Ministers belong to the supreme decision-making committee, known as the Cabinet. The Government Ministers are all members of Parliament, and are accountable to it. The Government is dependent on Parliament to make primary legislation, which means that in practice a government must seek re-election at least every five years. The monarch selects the Prime Minister as the leader of the party most likely to command a majority in Parliament.
Under the British constitution, executive authority lies with the monarch, although this authority is exercised only by, or on the advice of, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. The Cabinet members advise the monarch as members of the Privy Council. They also exercise power directly as leaders of the Government Departments.
The current Prime Minister is David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party, who was appointed by Queen Elizabeth II on 11 May 2010 following the UK General Election on 6 May 2010. The election failed to provide a decisive result, with the Conservatives as the biggest party within a hung parliament. A coalition government was formed on the 12th of May between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats (see Cameron ministry).
Read more about Government Of The United Kingdom: Government in Parliament, Government and The Crown, Limits of Government Power, Government Departments, Location, Devolved Governments, Local Government
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“The government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.”
—Calvin Coolidge (18721933)
“A little group of willful men, representing no opinion but their own, have rendered the great government of the United States helpless and contemptible.”
—Woodrow Wilson (18561924)
“For the people in government, rather than the people who pester it, Washington is an early-rising, hard-working city. It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth. Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
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“This is the Key of the Kingdom:
In that Kingdom is a city;”
—Unknown. This Is the Key (l. 12)