A constitutional thought..

[janzman]

..during the 60 minutes or so we were without a Prime Mininster, ie between HM accepting GB resignation and DC accepting invitation to govern,in the hypothetical event of a terr@rist attack, who would be in charge of the country ie who has their thumb on the nuclear button.......I wonder.....

[boxtops]

Oh well I'm wrong too then, but I thought it would be a military high-up. Who would the Queen consult then?

[AlBags]

Well the Queen has always had her own advisors .. in everything.
Not necessarily any member of parliament.
She can consult whoever she likes.

[joggerjayne]

boxy ...

The Ministry of Defence is part of the Government ...

Which is part of Parliament ...

Which was dissolved by the Queen at the behest of the Prime Minister when he called the General Election.

So the MoD did not really exist during that short period !

[Prudie]

Well i wish I knew that i wouldn't have gone to work.

[joggerjayne]

Although the MoD did not exist, the Armed Forces did, of course.

But the allegiance of the Armed Forces is to the Monarch.

So ... the Queen could have run the Army.

[boxtops]

True. Oh well - not a problem any longer, Dave is In.

[joggerjayne]

The whole fabric of the "Establishment" was held together by nothing more than constitutional conventions.

But then ... that is always the case.

We have, after all, no written Constitution.

[Prudie]

And although they may have been leaderless civil servants are not affiliated to any poltical party or government.

[joeluke]

Mandleson definitely wouldn't have had his finger on the button.......he'd rather have his hand on the knobb instead!

[mike11111]

Let us lay the final nail into that hoary old myth, that when parliament is dissolved we no longer have a government. We no longer have MPs, we still have a government. Ministers remain in office until such time as the PM resigns. Although ministers in this country (unlike the US) are largely drawn from MPs, their roles are separate and distinct, which allows them to draw two salaries. Ministers do not have to be members of either House of Parliament, and there are recent examples of this.

[joggerjayne]

Prudie ... precisely.

MPs come and go ... the Civil Service stays in place.

[janzman]

Brilliant from all...I can only wonder what the woefully non PC Alan B'Stard would have made of it all......LOL

[Barmaid]

I wouldn't trust any of them with the telly controls.

btw is this IHT upping to £1m going ahead? If so, bugger. I used to make a shed load of money on that.