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Is it time for fixed-term parliaments?

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William Crawley | 12:56 UK time, Saturday, 6 October 2007

William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, describes Gordon Brown as a "calculator", rather than an instinctive politician. There will be much calculating this weekend as the Prime Minister It looks like we will know this week if the PM is planning an election in November, but after weeks of speculation it could hardly now be described as a . There is, of course, no constitutional necessity for any election at this point, though there may be a perceived political need for one.

All the talk about a "mandate election" is evidence of the Americanization of British politics -- Prime Ministers are not, technically, elected in the UK's constitutional monarchy -- and one might expect that process to continue under Brown's leadership. After all, Gordon Brown likes to speak of "the British People", much as US politicians like to speak of "the American People"; his attempt to develop a cabinet of "all the talents" is a lunge towards the bipartisanship that is much-favoured in American politics; and Gordon's big conversation about constitutional reform includes a discussion, at least, about the introduction of a written constitution.

Now seems like a good time to ask whether we should remove from future Prime Ministers the right to determine when an election may be called, with the introduction of .

Update: 6pm. Gordon Brown an Autumn election.

Comments

  • 1.
  • At 04:42 PM on 06 Oct 2007,
  • Mark wrote:

Gordon Brown likes to use the term "The British People" until the term "EU referendum" comes up. Then he turns tail and runs for the hills as fast as his legs will carry him.

Writing a constitution for the UK would be a very difficult task. It would have to conform to whatever is agreed to in the obligations it has under the EU treaty. I assume any discrepancy between the two would have to be an 鈥渙pt out鈥 or the EU treaty would supervene. The ability of a nation to freely write its own constitution is reserved only to those that are truly sovereign over themselves. Britain no longer falls into that category. I still find it impossible to understand why a nation would meekly submit in one generation to foreign control over itself, something it fought off for centuries or what benefit the UK gets from being in the EU it could not obtain equally through bilateral trade agreements. If there were laws the EU made that the UK liked, it could adopt them itself word for word or modify them to suit its particular needs if it wanted to. I don鈥檛 get it, the altruistic sacrifice of an entire nation for some nebulous abstract higher purpose of no real direct benefit. I thought that was just the province of religion. Maybe for some politicians, the EU is their religion.

I鈥檇 read that Winston Churchill had brought up the subject of possible American Statehood for Britain during the war and Roosevelt told him in effect 鈥渘o way.鈥 Britain would have to give up much of what it now is including its monarchy. This whole notion still seems entirely implausible to me but it raises the question of 鈥淎mericanization鈥 of Britain鈥檚 government which was brought up here. Frankly I鈥檓 not so sure that is possible to any real degree either or that it is particularly desirable from the point of view of 鈥淭he British People.鈥 In a larger sense, the efforts of the EU to create a relatively homogeneous population from diverse heterogeneous elements of origin the way the US has doesn鈥檛 seem to be working out very well. There are a lot of problems it didn鈥檛 anticipate which it has to address, the integration of its large Moslem population with entirely different values which it seems in part resistant to giving up being just one of them.

  • 2.
  • At 05:47 PM on 06 Oct 2007,
  • Rhea wrote:

As an American, the idea that the PM can just "decide" that there needs to be an election is confusing, to say the least. It seems with a system like that, the PM can more effectively control the govt as a whole, which isn't a necessarily good thing. Couldn't he just have elections everytime his party is seen in a positive light, ensuring that his party wins the majority of the election? I know that if President Bush could pick when we have elections, that the Republicans would very likely still be in control of the House and Senate.

  • 3.
  • At 05:56 PM on 06 Oct 2007,
  • Rhea wrote:

As an American, the idea that the PM can just "decide" that there needs to be an election is confusing, to say the least. It seems with a system like that, the PM can more effectively control the govt as a whole, which isn't a necessarily good thing. Couldn't he just have elections everytime his party is seen in a positive light, ensuring that his party wins the majority of the election? I know that if President Bush could pick when we have elections, that the Republicans would very likely still be in control of the House and Senate.

  • 4.
  • At 08:08 PM on 06 Oct 2007,
  • Eagle1 wrote:

Will is quite right about the UK constitutional situation. PMs can use their power to call an election for political reasons, in fact whatever reason would they have to use that power. A better state of affairs would be if an election was required every four or five years. I would suggest five years as the figure, giving a government time to do something before they need to campaign again.

  • 5.
  • At 11:52 AM on 09 Oct 2007,
  • Gee Dubyah wrote:

In the UK a General election must be called after 5 years. The PM can call the election early, but he can't wait more than 5 years.

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