Independent Parliament

[Marky B]

What would happen at the next General Election if all the Independent candidates won the majority of seats in the House of Commons? I know it won't happen,but it is an interesting thought>

Ta Ta

Marky B

[vehelpfulguy]

Similar things happen in other countries (Italy for example) where no one party gets overall control. Often a number of small parties get together and agree to co-operate to form a government.

I suppose if all the indepents won in the UK they could agree to try to work together to form a government.

Of course as soon as they lost a couple of votes in the "house" confidence would be lost and they would probably have to call another general election.

[BigMac]

Interesting question, but how many independents are there? I can remember Martin Bell (Ind, Tatton) and you might call Gorgeous George an independent - but you can't form a government unless you have the support of a majority in the House of Commons.

So, you'd need approx 330 'independent' MPs who agreed to work together to form a government and these 'independent' MPs would have to agree on PM, Chancellor etc.

It could happen, but probably won't.

[Hammond Egg]

The leader of the party that had the largest number of MPs would be invited to form a government - he or she would probably need the support of some Independents. By their nature, Independents can't be considered as a party, and they wouldn't, as a block, form the new government.

[Marky B]

The question was hypothetical. Were there Independent candidates in every constituency? Anyway,considering the choices we might have at the next General Election...well,you never know. Thanks for the answers!

Ta Ta

Marky B

[bernardo]

If, by "Gorgeous George" you mean George Galloway, he's not an independent. He's an MP for the Respect Coalition. Anyway, if all MPs were independent, then the outgoing Prime Minister would advise the Queen to appoint a specific one of them as new PM. He or she would then form a cabinet, draw up a basic programme of legislation, and submit it to the House of Commons as the Queen's Speech. This whole process would take a month or more, so it would probably become fairly clear what the main issues were, and whether the new government would be viable.

This is the normal thing that used to happen in the UK a few hundred years ago; there are still some countries where political parties are banned and where MPs are elected as individuals rather than as party candidates.

[JudgeJ]

It would be a great idea if party politics were abolished in this country. The notion that we live under a �democratic� system is false. We live under an elected dictatorship.

I do not mean this to apply just to the present incumbents � it has applied ever since MPs banded together to form parties. Essentially in the UK every five years or so electors get the chance to vote for one of two packages. The owners of these packages say what they are going to do if elected and, when they are, are then free to do as they wish for the term of the Parliament.

Increasingly (and particularly at the moment) the two packages on offer are "marketed" to appeal to everybody and actually suit nobody. The original idea of Parliament was that each area sent its representative to the House and he voted on each individual issue as he saw fit, with the needs and wishes of his Constituents in mind. Returning to this system would mean that MPs were free to vote as their constituents would wish on individual issues and not be bound by party Whips. To see how popular this would be just examine the interest that is generated when (vary rarely) MPs are allowed a free vote on a particular issue.

Yes, it would cause problems, but none that could not be overcome. And the result would be infinitely preferable to the sham of a system we suffer today.

We have, at present, a Prime Minister who said, shortly after his election victory in 1997, that he did not see the function of backbenchers as that of representing their constituents� interests in the House of Commons. Instead he saw their role as one of persuading the electorate that the Government�s policies were right.

Need I say more?