"THE SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT IN THE UK

The UK is a monarchy. The head of state is Queen Elizabeth II. who has been the Queen since 1952 and her son Prince Charles, the Price of Wales, is the heir to the throne. The seat of the monarchy is in Great Britain and in the UK Overseas Territories is the Queen usually represented by governors.

The Queen in practice reigns, but doesn´t rule – she represents the state but many of her functions are just formal and symbolic. Among her duties are for example: appointing the government and judges, visiting foreign countries and holding state banquets. The country is governed in her name by the Government which is responsible to Parliament. The Queen has regular meetings with the Prime minister and she is informed about Cabinet decisions.

The 3 components of the UK system of government are.
The Legislature /parliament/, the Executive /the government and local authorities/, the Judiciary /the courts/

The UK Parliament is situated in Westminster in London and consists of the Queen, the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Each annual session is opened by a speech which reads the Queen from throne in the House of Lords. All the pariliamentary proceedings are public, they are broadcasted on TV or radio.

The House of Lords consists of approximately 500 life peers, 92 hereditary peers and 26 senior clergy and it is presided over by the Lord Chancellor.

House of Commons is the law making authority.and consists of 659 members who are elected by adults in General election every fifth year or more frequantly. The chief of the House of Commons is the Speaker.

There are several main political parties in Britain. The most important and strongest of them are Conservative party and Labour party.Another existing party is the Liberal Democrats.

The party which wins most seats at a General election forms the Government. The leader of the party which won the General elections is appointed by the Queen as Prime Minister. He is now a head of the Government and chooses approximately 100 ministers of whom 20 are in the cabinet.

Cabinet is the executive organ of government and meets weekly at no. 10 Downing street to decide on major government questions. The government is controlled by Parliament and so called „shadow cabinet“.

„Shadow cabinet“ is formed by the members of the party which wins the second largest number of seats. This party becomes the official Opposition and watches and critisizes the work of current government."

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