by Mark Hopkins

Created on: March 11, 2008   Last Updated: February 19, 2010

The position of Prime Minister of Great Britain has never been decided by direct election. At General Elections voters choose M.P.s to represent them in Parliament. The Queen decides whom to invite to be Prime Minister. By tradition, she asks the leader of the Party with a majority of M.P.s (and therefore seats) in the lower House, the Commons, to 'form a government'. Upon accepting, he or she becomes the Queen's 'First Minister'. Britain, of course, is famous for NOT having a written Constitution, aside from a few Acts passed in the late seventeenth century such as the Bill of Rights. Like most things, our way of doing things has evolved through pragmatism and trial and error and no doubt will continue to do so.

Gordon Brown has a perfect right to be Prime Minister, from the strictly legal or Constitutional point of view. He took over from Tony Blair as leader of the Labour Party, which has an overall majority of seats in the Commons. No one stood against him in the leadership contest. The Queen certainly could not be expected to refuse to ask him to be Prime Minister and it is a bit rich for voters to moan now that he is. At the last General Election in 2007 it was quite clear that Blair was unlikely to survive a full 5 year term. His involvement with President Bush and the war in Iraq had made him too unpopular. Brown was known to be the probable successor. Voters still returned a Labour government.

The unpopularity of Mr Brown with some people highlights a growing trend in British politics, towards voting for personalities and looks rather than policies. Mr Brown has not made any outrageous departures from Labour Party policy, at least not any more than any politician might. People who 'voted Labour' are still 'getting Labour'. But Mr Brown is less telegenic than Mr Blair. He lacks the relaxed manner and permanent, toothy, grin. Mr Brown appears more serious and his smile more forced, the product of some expert's body language make-over. Worse, he may actually be an intellectual with a belief in traditional Labour Party values. No one could have accused Mr Blair of that! The 'telegenic disease' can be seen also in the Tory party, which has chosen pretty boy Old Etonian David Cameron, a bit of a Blair look-alike, as its leader and even more so in the Liberal Democrats who have just dumped Sir Menzies Campbell for Mr Clegg.

Having democratically voted for up to five more years of Labour party policies at the last General Election, the British people should

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>