The effect a coalition has on the Prime minister's government

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  • Created by: CPunt
  • Created on: 04-03-15 18:14

The effect a coalition has on the Prime minister's government

Advantages

  • The coalition government has given the PM a clear majority in the HoC, meaning that although the government has lost 6 votes, they have not lost any major votes. Currently the coalition majority in the HoC is 359 and others are 291.
  • Once policies have been agreed to by the coalition cabinet, they have the aditional authority as they are supported by the 2 parties and so represent the a concencus view. In the cabinet there are 17 tories and 5 lib dems. These numbers are proportional to the number of seats the have in the HoC.
  • The coalition has a strong democratic mandate, as the 2 parties were elected by over 50% of those who voted. In the 2010 elections overall the coalition % was 59. Tories had 36% and lib dems had 23%.

Disadvantages

  • Policy has to be cleared with the coalition partners, and this can cause tensions. The january 2013 vote to redraw constituency boundaries (gerrymandering: redraw constituencies for advantage of the party). Lib Dems opposed, then voted down the policy.
  • The PM is more vulnerable to dissidence (rebelling) within his party and within a coalition. In 2014 Lib Dems introduced setting the foreign aid bills budget up to 0.7%, most tories tried to fillibuster the vote. However it failed and the bill went through.
  • The PM's power of patronage (the power to hire and fire) is limited as he can not appoint all the cabinet members himself. Coalition agreement for stability and reform (coalition 'ground rules') cabinet members is in proportion to the size of party in the HoC. This means Nick Clegg controls 5 of the 22 cabinet members.

Evaluation

Overall the disadvantages outweigh the advantages. Firstly many of the people who voted did not do so for a coaltion, the majority did not vote for them. It aslo hinders the PM's powers and he does not get all the support he should get from his cabinet as some of them are the opposition.

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