How Does the Government Organise its Majority -The Whips Overview
Carrots and Sticks used by the Whips
Managing your majority through Parliamentary Private Secretaries
Managing your majority by working with Party Groups
Free Votes in the House of Commons
Types of MPs – The Constituency Activist
Types of MPs – The Aspiring Minister
Types of MPs- The House of Commons Expert
Types of MPs- The Policy Entrepreneur
Controlling the Executive – Introduction
Controlling the Executive by Legislation
Controlling the Executive with Finance
Controlling the Executive through Appointments
Controlling the Executive through Questions
Controlling the Executive through Ministerial Statements
Controlling the Executive with Opposition Debates
Controlling the Executive through Select Committees
Overview of MP Expenses and Interests
Below are two examples where Parliament has reflected the voice of nation or public opinion.
Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister had carried out a policy of appeasement of Germany before 1939 and, forced to enter the war when Poland was invaded, was a poor wartime prime Minister. The sudden attack by Hitler on Norway exposed how badly prepared Britain was.
Chamberlain defended his policy in a debate on the issue and implied that the Conservative whips would ensure Government support in the vote, which the Opposition Labour Party had forced, as the Conservative had a majority of 213 from the 1935 General Election.
There were devastating speeches from Sir Roger Keyes, a Conservative MP and former Admiral, who criticised military policy, from Leo Amery, a former Conservative Minister, who echoed the words of Cromwell to the Long Parliament, “You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing ……In the name of God go” and Lloyd George, the Prime Minister who won the First World War, who replied sarcastically, “Hitler does not hold himself answerable to the whips” and called on Chamberlain to resign.
The Government majority fell to 81 as many Conservative MPs voted against or abstained”. Chamberlain, seriously weakened, tried to form a coalition with Labour but they refused to join while he was Prime Minister and he had to resign and Churchill replaced him.
A number of MPs had warned that the system of claiming expenses for improvements to the second homes that MPs needed in London and the ability to make their other home their second home and claim for that as well was leading to abuses. When the Daily Telegraph exposed what a few MPs had been claiming there was a huge public reaction against Parliament.
The Speaker, Michael Martin, had presided over the expenses system and had moved too slowly to avert the scandal. In the debate in June 2009, senior MPs from both sides, not implicated in the scandal, bitterly attacked the Speaker when normally the Speaker is seen as above reproach. Sir Patrick Cormack, an expert on the history of Parliament referred to the Norway debate.
Although there was no vote on the issue the Speaker resigned the next day, the first Speaker to be forced out by the Commons in over 300 years.
