and if necessary throw them out.
people.
Carrington power is outside the Commons.' WHO really runs the country? The democracy struggle in the Labour Party has once again raised this question.
The right wingers say that the reforms in the party threaten democracy — the right of the population to elect MPs, control governments, In fact, the parliamentary system goes nowhere near ensuring control of and by the To start with, parliament does not just con sist of elected MPs. There is also the House of Lords, which isn't elected but has the power to delav and control legislation. Cabinet ministers can be, and are, chosen from the House of Lords, like the present foreign secretary, Lord The cabinet itself is chosen by the prime minister, who has absolute power to appoint or sack anyone he or she wants. During Harold Wilson's reign he appointed 100 cabinet ministers, 403 junior ministers, created 243 peers, appointed 24 chairpeople of nationalised industries, and 16 heads of royal commissions.
The prime minister is not elected either -but chosen by the monarch. In 1931 King George V re-appointed Ramsay MacDonald as PM, although by that time he had ditched the Labour Party, on the strength of whose votes he had originally become prime minister in 1929 Once appointed, the cabinet only has to refer legislation to parliament. Without consulting parliament, cabinets can — and have — declared war. states of emergency. and embarked on a new weapons programme, as Attlee did when the British atom bomb programme was initiated.
Indeed, there are many things cabinet ministers are not allowed to tell parliament.
On taking office they take a privy coun cillor's oath which imposes a special obligation to preserve government secrecy. Cabinet minutes Nor can the cabinet and government be removed from office by parliament. A convention has grown up whereby a government resigns if it loses a vote of confidence, but there is no Strangely enough, the cabinet has the right to sack parliament — which it does when it calls a I his means that a government which has minority support in its own party, the party that voters put in power, can force its policies on the party by threatening to resign from office and The whole idea that the most popular party at the polls automatically becomes the government is rendered false by the practice of forming coalitions, through which governments are established for which no one voted. Britain has spent 24 years under coalition or minority itself as long as it likes. It did so in 1914 and 1939, leading to parliaments which lasted eight So the whole idea that when the voters go to the polls they are electing a government is a The late cabinet minister Richard Crossman offered this view of the House of Commons: 'It can only advise and warn, as the monarchy could 100 years, ago, whereas the effective Socialist Challenge 12 March 1981
By Arthur Smith Soviet Communist Party congress