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Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland | |
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Currently dissolved Most recent: 58th Parliament | |
![]() Logo used to represent Parliament since 2018 | |
Type | |
Type | |
Houses | |
Sovereign | King of the United Kingdom |
History | |
Established | 1 January 1801 |
Preceded by | |
Succeeded by | Provisional Parliament (Irish Free State only) |
Leadership | |
Charles III since 8 September 2022 | |
The Lord McFall of Alcluith since 1 May 2021 | |
Sir Lindsay Hoyle since 4 November 2019 | |
Rishi Sunak, Conservative since 25 October 2022 | |
Sir Keir Starmer, Labour since 4 April 2020 | |
Structure | |
Seats | |
![]() | |
Lords political groups |
HM Government
|
Commons political groups | Vacant seats |
Elections | |
Last Commons election | 12 December 2019 |
Next Commons election | 4 July 2024 |
Meeting place | |
Palace of Westminster City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom 51°29′58″N 0°07′29″W / 51.49944°N 0.12472°W | |
Website | |
www |
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland[d] is the supreme legislative body[e] of the United Kingdom, and may also legislate for the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories.[3][4] It meets at the Palace of Westminster in London. Parliament possesses legislative supremacy and thereby holds ultimate power over all other political bodies in the United Kingdom and the Overseas Territories. While Parliament is bicameral, it has three parts: the sovereign, the House of Lords, and the House of Commons.[5] The three parts acting together to legislate may be described as the King-in-Parliament.[6] The Crown normally acts on the advice of the prime minister, and the powers of the House of Lords are limited to only delaying legislation; thus power is de facto vested in the House of Commons.[7]
The House of Commons is the elected lower chamber of Parliament, with elections to 650 single-member constituencies held at least every five years under the first-past-the-post system.[8] By constitutional convention, all government ministers, including the prime minister, are members of the House of Commons, or less commonly the House of Lords, and are thereby accountable to the respective branches of the legislature. Most Cabinet ministers are from the Commons, while junior ministers can be from either house.
The House of Lords is the upper chamber of Parliament,[9] comprising two types of members. The most numerous are the Lords Temporal, consisting mainly of life peers appointed by the sovereign on the advice of the prime minister,[10] plus up to 92 hereditary peers. The less numerous Lords Spiritual consist of up to 26 bishops of the Church of England. Before the establishment of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom in 2009, the House of Lords performed judicial functions through the law lords.
The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the oldest legislature in the world[citation needed] and is characterised by the stability of its governing institutions and its capacity to absorb change.[11] The Westminster system shaped the political systems of the nations once ruled by the British Empire, and thus has been called the "mother of parliaments".[12][f]
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The phrase 'Crown in Parliament' is used to describe the British legislature, which consists of the Sovereign, the House of Lords and the House of Commons.
22. Our remit requires us to accept "the primacy of the House of Commons". It is worth considering what this means in the context of legislation, and of the conventions operating between the two Houses. 23. Constitutional and Administrative Law by O. Hood Phillips and Jackson declares it to be a constitutional convention that "In cases of conflict the Lords should ultimately yield to the Commons."[34] It goes on to observe that this convention was backed until 1911 by the possibility of packing the Lords with government supporters, and has been underpinned since then by the Parliament Acts.
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