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Forums - General - A question to those in the UK

SamuelRSmith on 30 June 2009
Lolcislaw said:
Britain should get a codified Constitution first, because it does not have one, so its hard sometimes to actually define the relations of power.

I'm against a codified constitution on the grounds that I don't think any previous Government/Parliament should hold any kind of bind on future Parliaments/Governments. The UK system is based upon Sovereignty of Parliament, after all (and, no, let's not get into how this actually plays out in the real world, we'll be here all day).



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SciFiBoy on 30 June 2009
SamuelRSmith said:
SciFiBoy said:
SamuelRSmith said:
I personally don't think the Lords have enough power. They should be largely or wholly elected body with nigh-on equal amounts of power to the Commons.

The Commons has, over the centuries, slowly been eroding the powers of all the checks and balances that surround it. We're essentially living in a unicameral system, yet we pay for a bicameral one.

The Commons is too powerful and it needs to be reduced.



how would you structure that and what sort of powers would you give the HoL?

Once the Commons has passed something, if the Lords would have to put a 75% no vote to block it, and the could do so indefinitely - as long as they give a basis and suggest amendments.

As for the structure, I'd go for 70% elected, 30% appointed. The 70% elected would be done on a purely PR system, and the terms would be longer than the Commons - Lords elections every 10 years, or so. The 30% would not be appointed by the Commons, but by an independent body who appoint solely on intellectual merits rather than for political gains. Appointed Lords will serve until they choose to retire, or if the appointment body deems that they are acting unprofessionally (never turning up, corruption, etc).

So the Commons will still have more power than the Lords, to keep the process quick (as loci is law pointed out ), but the Lords will hold a lot more scrutiny over the UK.

Of course, with my kind of devolution plans, this structure would simply be for the England, Wales, Scottish and Ulster Parliaments. Not the UK one (of which would not exist).

ok, im not sure about the 30% unelected part myself, but the rest makes sense i guess.

im in favour of devolution so i can agree to that part fine.



SamuelRSmith on 30 June 2009
TheRealMafoo said:
kowenicki said:

Well I suppose we could go for presidents and get people like Nixon, Carter and Bush jnr in on the act.....
Then again.....

The Royal family have no real power any more and cost the UK tax payer 69p per person per year. No big deal really. I dont know why people get excited about this either way.

Is that 69 pounds?

If so, at 61 million people, that's 4.2 billion a year. A hell of a lot more then we pay for our Prez (and you still need to pay your PM).

No, 69 pence. 100p = £1

So divide your figure by 100

Our PM isn't paid anymore than any other minister. The PM, by concept, is merely a "first amongst equals" when it comes to them Vs other Ministers. This has been going downhill since Thatcher, though, with the birth of Prime-Ministerial Government, and Blair really started to push the idea of a Presidential-Prime Minister in terms of public relations (centering campaigns around personality of the party leader rather than the the party, being an international statesmen rather than the foreign minister, that kind of thing).



SamuelRSmith on 30 June 2009
SciFiBoy said:
SamuelRSmith said:
SciFiBoy said:
SamuelRSmith said:
I personally don't think the Lords have enough power. They should be largely or wholly elected body with nigh-on equal amounts of power to the Commons.

The Commons has, over the centuries, slowly been eroding the powers of all the checks and balances that surround it. We're essentially living in a unicameral system, yet we pay for a bicameral one.

The Commons is too powerful and it needs to be reduced.



how would you structure that and what sort of powers would you give the HoL?

Once the Commons has passed something, if the Lords would have to put a 75% no vote to block it, and the could do so indefinitely - as long as they give a basis and suggest amendments.

As for the structure, I'd go for 70% elected, 30% appointed. The 70% elected would be done on a purely PR system, and the terms would be longer than the Commons - Lords elections every 10 years, or so. The 30% would not be appointed by the Commons, but by an independent body who appoint solely on intellectual merits rather than for political gains. Appointed Lords will serve until they choose to retire, or if the appointment body deems that they are acting unprofessionally (never turning up, corruption, etc).

So the Commons will still have more power than the Lords, to keep the process quick (as loci is law pointed out ), but the Lords will hold a lot more scrutiny over the UK.

Of course, with my kind of devolution plans, this structure would simply be for the England, Wales, Scottish and Ulster Parliaments. Not the UK one (of which would not exist).

ok, im not sure about the 30% unelected part myself, but the rest makes sense i guess.

im in favour of devolution so i can agree to that part fine.

A partly appointed Lords would be far more effective at strutinising the Commons than a wholly elected one. The plus about the the Lords is that people get in because they are experts in certain fields. In a Bill focused around healthcare, for example, wouldn't it be best to have professors and high up medical experts reading through and strutinising the Bill rather than just people who got in because they know how to wow the crowds with buzz words?



SciFiBoy on 30 June 2009
SamuelRSmith said:
SciFiBoy said:
SamuelRSmith said:
SciFiBoy said:
SamuelRSmith said:
I personally don't think the Lords have enough power. They should be largely or wholly elected body with nigh-on equal amounts of power to the Commons.

The Commons has, over the centuries, slowly been eroding the powers of all the checks and balances that surround it. We're essentially living in a unicameral system, yet we pay for a bicameral one.

The Commons is too powerful and it needs to be reduced.



how would you structure that and what sort of powers would you give the HoL?

Once the Commons has passed something, if the Lords would have to put a 75% no vote to block it, and the could do so indefinitely - as long as they give a basis and suggest amendments.

As for the structure, I'd go for 70% elected, 30% appointed. The 70% elected would be done on a purely PR system, and the terms would be longer than the Commons - Lords elections every 10 years, or so. The 30% would not be appointed by the Commons, but by an independent body who appoint solely on intellectual merits rather than for political gains. Appointed Lords will serve until they choose to retire, or if the appointment body deems that they are acting unprofessionally (never turning up, corruption, etc).

So the Commons will still have more power than the Lords, to keep the process quick (as loci is law pointed out ), but the Lords will hold a lot more scrutiny over the UK.

Of course, with my kind of devolution plans, this structure would simply be for the England, Wales, Scottish and Ulster Parliaments. Not the UK one (of which would not exist).

ok, im not sure about the 30% unelected part myself, but the rest makes sense i guess.

im in favour of devolution so i can agree to that part fine.

A partly appointed Lords would be far more effective at strutinising the Commons than a wholly elected one. The plus about the the Lords is that people get in because they are experts in certain fields. In a Bill focused around healthcare, for example, wouldn't it be best to have professors and high up medical experts reading through and strutinising the Bill rather than just people who got in because they know how to wow the crowds with buzz words?

actually yeah, that does make sense i guess



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tombi123 on 30 June 2009
TheRealMafoo said:
kowenicki said:

Well I suppose we could go for presidents and get people like Nixon, Carter and Bush jnr in on the act.....
Then again.....

The Royal family have no real power any more and cost the UK tax payer 69p per person per year. No big deal really. I dont know why people get excited about this either way.

Is that 69 pounds?

If so, at 61 million people, that's 4.2 billion a year. A hell of a lot more then we pay for our Prez (and you still need to pay your PM).


No, thats 69 pence which gets shortened to 69p. 100 pence to the pound. So thats £42M.



The Fury on 30 June 2009
TheRealMafoo said:
kowenicki said:

Well I suppose we could go for presidents and get people like Nixon, Carter and Bush jnr in on the act.....
Then again.....

The Royal family have no real power any more and cost the UK tax payer 69p per person per year. No big deal really. I dont know why people get excited about this either way.

Is that 69 pounds?

If so, at 61 million people, that's 4.2 billion a year. A hell of a lot more then we pay for our Prez (and you still need to pay your PM).

No, the 'p' is pence, as in our equivilent of the cent. "£" is pound. EDIT: as tombi123 just said.

42million isn't that much, if you put it against what we just gave a bunch of money greedy banks.



Hmm, pie.

JustinUK on 30 June 2009

Tourism. I live in Windsor. The home of wonderful trinkets like the Princess Diana ashtray. Honour her memory by stubbing your cigarette out on her face.

I'm not sure if they come for the existing royal family or the castle. Would they still come if the family didn't live there? There is a lot of ceremony at the castle such as the changing of the guard every day. Still, it's kinda nice to see so many people enjoying themselves.



Lolcislaw on 30 June 2009

Parliamentary Soveregnity is a good thing, very dangerous but good, things get done . UK is a Stable country therefore it kinda works, giving so much power to the Government.

But it leaves too much freedom and secrecy for those would would like to abuse it, high majority through FPTP (and Whip System) guarantees passage of bills. Codified Constitution would merely be some sort of collection of cardinal rules and rights that do exist even today.

I wouldnt want entrenched constitution like American One (although that one is Genius, written by geniuses)




TheRealMafoo on 30 June 2009

Ahh, thanks. I thought that was a lot :)

42 million is still a fair amount of money, but less then we spend just flying the president around.