10 Downing Street rejects calls for formal line of succession for Prime Minister

[Richard Hakluyt]

I can see all kinds of problems with having a defined succession. And the PM getting killed is only a problem in an emergency. Surely existing war/emergency plans will be in place/kick in in such a situation, and presumably these deal with what happens if the PM is killed or isolated and unable to communicate.

I know that such plans certainly existed in the 1970s, the potential emergency being nuclear war with the Soviet Union, under those circumstances it would be difficult for Parliament to meet.

In more mundane circumstances, such as the PM getting assassinated, the new PM will simply be the person who can form a new government.

Otto is correct in what he says. Some pond wars in the earlier days of the internet were caused by British disrespect for the US president. I recall criticising Bush back in the day and an American poster getting quite cross and being rude about Blair to get even  . By about 2002 I realised that any criticism of the US president had to be circumspect, it was difficult for a foreigner to criticise the officeholder without also criticising the US. I suppose many people would like to both, but speaking personally I believe that both the UK and the USA are great countries that have been rather let down by their political elites in recent years.

[Martinus]

Since there is no true third branch in Britain (like our judiciary, in the UK the judiciary is no longer totally under the thumb of Parliament as it was traditionally and is semi-autonomous, but isn't a constitutional review court like the SCOTUS) this makes the Prime Minister extremely powerful.

You are as usual talking out of your ass here. The ability to review constitutionality of the acts of the legislative is not the same as the independence of the judiciary.

To this day, most democratic countries have a separate constitutional tribunal for reviewing the constitutionality of the acts of the legislative - common courts (including a supreme court) being able to do so is more unique than you think.

As to your claim about the power of the Prime Minister, it has nothing to do with the judiciary not being independent (in fact it is independent in the UK) but the fact that there is in fact no independent (or semi-independent) executive in the UK - the Prime Minister gets his power directly from the legislative and he has no independent executive mandate (the way e.g. US or French Presidents do). So the imbalance of power in the UK comes from the legislative having the executive, not the judiciary, under its thumb.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Of course the royal succession is carefully defined and, if times were really bad, then whoever was King/Queen could appoint the PM as necessary 

[Duque de Bragança]

In practice, within the UK they are almost an "elected dictator" and have far greater domestic power than a U.S. President.

Elected dictator? I thought this description applied to the President of the French Republic. 

[Gups]

Hailsham never used the term "elective dictator" to describe the power of the PM. He was talking about the power of the Government in Parliament - e.g. the amount of time it had to push through Bills and called it an "elective dictatorship".

When he was talking (mid 1970s) the PM had considerably less power than he does now. The PM was still very much primus inter pares in a cabinet government. Thatcher and then Blair increased the number of sub-commitees and political advisers to make the PM more powerful at the expense of the cabinet.

[dps]

When he was talking (mid 1970s) the PM had considerably less power than he does now. The PM was still very much primus inter pares in a cabinet government. Thatcher and then Blair increased the number of sub-commitees and political advisers to make the PM more powerful at the expense of the cabinet.

The subcommitees I can see, but how does having more political advisers make the PM more powerful?

[Gups]

I shoudl have said special advisers rather than political advisors. They are temporary civil cervants appointed by the PM.

They act as effective supervisors of some cabinet ministers. Some advisors (e.g. Alistair Campbell) become powerful in their own right. It is not formal power but it is power.

[Neil]

As to your claim about the power of the Prime Minister, it has nothing to do with the judiciary not being independent (in fact it is independent in the UK) but the fact that there is in fact no independent (or semi-independent) executive in the UK - the Prime Minister gets his power directly from the legislative and he has no independent executive mandate (the way e.g. US or French Presidents do). So the imbalance of power in the UK comes from the legislative having the executive, not the judiciary, under its thumb.

The judiciary is also under their thumb because of the supremacy of Parliament.  There is no law that Parliament can't pass.  From a day-to-day standpoint, that really doesn't matter, but the fact is that the legislative branch is all-powerful.

At any rate, this idiot needs his head examined for wanting to Americanify his political system.  Everything about their system is bad, and even Blair is going to reside in a special circle of hell (with Pierre Trudeau)for moving in that direction.

[Neil]

When he was talking (mid 1970s) the PM had considerably less power than he does now. The PM was still very much primus inter pares in a cabinet government. Thatcher and then Blair increased the number of sub-commitees and political advisers to make the PM more powerful at the expense of the cabinet.

And the media overload in which we live has really helped with that.  The PM has become the face of the party to a much greater degree than was once the case.  Instead of having blocks of MPs who owed their election at least in part to forceful personalities that usually found themselves in Cabinet (or shadow cabinet), everyone is elected on the coattails of the PM now.

[Malthus]

Strikes me that the reason for the differnce between the UK and US is the presence of a living sovereign - who could, in an emergency, appoint a PM.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Yeah the PM's motorcade is shit.  I was in Rome when the Pope's funeral was happening and the American President's motorcade was almost ridiculous.  I was waiting to cross the road and it drove into the Vatican (it may have been larger because I think it had both Bushes and Clinton, if not all living Presidents).  We were stood there for about five minutes, by the end people were laughing it was so absurd.

If you live or work in the D.C. area you develop an abject hatred for Presidential motorcades. It's the traffic equivalent of a 50-car pileup in a snowstorm.

I don't know about his international travel but the massive impact on local travel is one reason Presidential motorcades are actually much less common than they used to be. People sort of make fun of the President because he'll use Marine One (his $12bn helicopter fleet) to travel from a city's airport to a location nearby where he is speaking to avoid using a motorcade. This isn't done because the President is trying to avoid the "hassle" of riding in a car but because they're trying to limit the disruption to local traffic patterns.

Of course some locations you can't get a helicopter into safely so the motorcade comes out, but they try to use it as little as possible because of its ridiculousness.

In the U.S. it isn't just the size of the motorcade, but the fact that they literally shut down traffic along its entire route and clear the roadway. This happens hours before the motorcade comes through. If the President is going to ride in a car down the street then not only is that street closed to regular traffic, the Secret Service literally walks the entire route checking for any possible bombs or other devices which might have been placed on the route. They even make sure all the manholes are totally sealed so no one would be able to come out of one during the ride.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Just noticed this bit.  The judiciary's always been entirely independent.  But Parliament is still theoretically supreme and with certain EU exceptions they can't do anything against an Act of Parliament.  Obviously there's no codified constitution that would enable them to review legislation as the Supreme Court does.

I may have given the wrong impression by using the word "independent." I was just referring to how traditionally the closest thing the Brits had to the U.S. Supreme Court were the Law Lords, who were technically part of Parliament (since they were sitting members of the House of Lords); but that changed when the Supreme Court of the U.K. was created.

I didn't mean it to imply that judges were controlled by parliament in terms of how they oversaw cases and such, but the structure and powers of the court system are defined solely by the Parliament (unless I'm mistaken.) That's a contrast to the U.S. where Article III gives the Federal judiciary a certain foundation that even congress cannot undermine through any legislation.

[Richard Hakluyt]

I'm trying to recall when the British PM started using motorcades. I recall some anger at Blair having 6 cars and motorbike outriders in his, but can't recall previous PMs using them (excluding ceremonial and state occasions).

When did this annoying practice start  ?

[OttoVonBismarck]

You are as usual talking out of your ass here. The ability to review constitutionality of the acts of the legislative is not the same as the independence of the judiciary.

When I used the term "independence" I was not implying that judges were not independent decision makers. I was referring to the fact that every court in the UK, to my knowledge at least, is a creation of Parliamentary statute and exists at the pleasure of Parliament. Parliament can restructure the court system "at will." I certainly wasn't saying individual judges were not independent decision makers, I think the UK has had that since its inception in the Act of Union and at least in England the tradition of judges with independent decision making ability is an ancient one.

Mind I was explaining to Raz (an American) why he was wrong to think the PM was lacking in power. To an American the best way to understand the power of the PM is to think of what kind of power the President would have if he was also the head of Congress and the SCOTUS did not have any ability to strike down laws he passed, in addition to all of his current powers.

That's an important note for an American observer, because if the President was the Head of Congress, in our system the SCOTUS could still undermine the President by declaring his laws unconstitutional.

Note that I'm not criticizing the British system at all, I actually quite like the British form of government. Especially in comparison to the garbage political systems of continental Europe.

As to your claim about the power of the Prime Minister, it has nothing to do with the judiciary not being independent (in fact it is independent in the UK) but the fact that there is in fact no independent (or semi-independent) executive in the UK - the Prime Minister gets his power directly from the legislative and he has no independent executive mandate (the way e.g. US or French Presidents do). So the imbalance of power in the UK comes from the legislative having the executive, not the judiciary, under its thumb.

I noted this in my first post to Raz.

[Gups]

I may have given the wrong impression by using the word "independent." I was just referring to how traditionally the closest thing the Brits had to the U.S. Supreme Court were the Law Lords, who were technically part of Parliament (since they were sitting members of the House of Lords); but that changed when the Supreme Court of the U.K. was created.

The Law Lords were members of the House of Lords but didn't as legislators. I think in theory they could have but by convention did not.

Interesting (to me) factoid - the sole case I've ever had that got as far as the Lords was the penultimate case they heard.