The incumbent government decides. The Prime Minister asks for a dissolution of Parliament, which is invariably granted, and the election follows a few weeks later. It’s a perk of incumbency that the American administration doesn’t have.
Wait, so does the PM come under this, too? When the PM asks for a dissolution, the entire Parliament gets re-voted? How does the PM decide when it’s time?
Man, maybe I should go look this up, rather than asking you to explain every little intricacy. Do you have any good links? I am fascinated - never even heard of this.
American here, but I do know this!
The Prime Minister is actually a member of Parliament in a parliamentary system, rather than being an independent executive office. The PM is an MP, in other words. So the PM will generally call an election at an advantageous time for his party…say it’s been four years since the last election, and the majority party (or the leading party in a coalition government) has just passed an extremely popular law in the face of opposition from the other party. The PM will likely call for elections immediately after that law is passed, because the timing is advantageous to his party.
Looking it up on Wiki now. Thanks, jayajay! Now, see, it would be awesome if someone would start a thread on such things. But nooooooo, it’s all “Obama does this” and “McCain does that”.
Belgium just took six months between elections and the formation of a government.
Early in the fifth year is considered a reasonable time to call an election. Much later than that and it looks bad, like the government is clinging on to power, because historically that has been the case with late-called elections. So generally a government that is doing OK will call the election after four years and a bit. But there is a gearing up for elections that starts at least a year beforehand, and by convention there are only certain Thursdays on which an election can fall, so we do tend to have an idea of when the election will be some months in advance. It’s not like everything just tootles along normally and then WHAM, four weeks of electioneering.
They also tend to only be at certain times of the year. Not mid-winter, both because Christmas gets in the way and because of the risk of disruption from bad weather on election day. Not during the summer, when everybody just wants to have a break instead. So by elimination, they’re mostly in the spring or autumn.
There are other countries? 
No, rest assured, there are some islands like Europe off the coast somewhere, and our Canadian Geese sanctuary to the north. And I understand we maintain some kind of non-union labor pool to the south. On the other side of the world is a factory called China, where our dinnerware is made.
Your American system is actually pretty aberrant, in that executive power is vested in the head of state: most countries split the offices, with the leader of the party garnering the most votes as the head of government and thus the holder of executive office, but a separate - either elected or hereditary - head of state. Americans are fond of denouncing the British Crown as an unjust anachronism, but if you compare the actual functions of the offices, the Queen is in effect a hereditary President whereas the US President is an elected King.
Oh, OK, so here’s a question - after five years there *has *to be an election? What happens if the current government doesn’t want? What policies are in place to force it to happen?
The current government doesn’t really have a choice. There will be some sort of constitutional/legal provision that automatically dissolves the parliament after a certain period of years. In Australia the Constitution requires that a House of Representatives last no more than three years:
The Governor-General is given the power to issue writs for an election:
From what **Spoons ** says I imagine the process in Canada is pretty much the same.
I guess the UK system is similar to those of Canada, Australia and so on. There must be an election at least every five years. The power to dissolve Parliament rests with the Queen. The PM makes a request to the Queen, and convention dictates that such a request is always granted.
If a government attempted to avoid calling an election, I imagine the Queen could just dissolve Parliament anyway. She is also Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces.
I’m still reading through this article but it seems to be a decent introduction to the basic structure of British politics.
Pretty much, yes. A House of Commons can last five years, but should that time expire and the Government doesn’t want to leave, the Governor-General (GG) dissolves Parliament, and calls an election.
Most often, the PM picks an advantageous time to call an election, and asks the GG to dissolve Parliament and “drop the writ”–that is, to call an election. But there are a few other times when an election might occur:
– When the Government does something so absolutely idiotic, or passes a law that is extremely unpopular, that civil unrest might ensue. In this case, the GG can step in without the PM asking, dissolve Parliament, and drop the writ. This has never happened in Canadian history, but I believe it has in Australian history. Aussie Dopers?
– When the Government is what we call a “minority government,” and loses a vote of confidence in the House. I should explain. Let’s say there are 100 seats in the House (it’s a nice round number). There are three parties, A, B, and C. In an election, Party A wins 40 seats. Parties B and C each win 30 seats. Technically, Party A, winning more seats than any other party, wins the election and forms the government. But compared to the number of seats that are not Party A’s, Party A is a minority in the House. If Parties B or C decided to vote against Party A on a confidence vote, Party A’s government would end and another election would occur. This did happen relatively recently in Canadian history, when Joe Clark’s Progressive Conservative party, which had formed a minority government, was defeated on a vote of confidence late in 1979. An election was called for early 1980, and Pierre Trudeau’s Liberal party won.
This is a very simple overview, and other countries with parliamentary systems may differ in details. Anyway, Anaamika, hope this helps a bit.
You know Spoons, I - as a Canadian - read and understood everything you wrote. But I’m guessing to those unfamiliar with the process it sounded like a Monty Python skit!
IIRC, a Canadian government can lose confidence by losing a confidence vote as mentioned above (such as voting on the federal budget or the Throne Speech), but there is also a “simple” Motion of Non-confidence, in which the Opposition can declare that they have lost confidence in the ability of the leading party to govern. If it passes, then the government either has to resign or ask for an election call.
I did a mock parliament in Grade 9, and we tried to have a vote of non-confidence against the “Liberals” on the first day, but the teacher told us we couldn’t, because they deserved a chance to do better and learn how it was done. Us “traitors” in the Bloc Québecois got a lot of criticism from the other students because of it, but the Reforms were on our side! (did I mention this was 1995-1996? The Québec Referendum had just ended…lots of “taking it too seriously” going on… good times, good times!)
I believe that the Governor-General could ask the leader of another party to form a government rather than dissolving parliament in the no-confidence vote situation. If that gets turned down, then the GG would issue the writs.
If a government lost a no confidence motion in Australia, the PM would be expected to resign his commission immediately. As **Kiwi Fruit ** notes, the Governor-General would first try to find someone else who could command a majority in the House of Representatives to lead a new government. Failing that, writs would be issued for a general election.
Not quite. In 1975 the Whitlam Labor government, while unpopular, wasn’t trying to pass any extreme legislation. It was seeking to pass the normal ‘supply’ bills that allow the government to spend taxpayers’ money.
The government had a majority in the lower house (House of Representatives). However it lacked a majority in the upper house (Senate), where the opposition had the numbers. Under the Constitution the Australian Senate basically has equal powers to those of the House of Representatives. It can refuse to pass any legislation, even appropriation bills, for as long as it wants. This is in contrast to the situation in the UK, where the People’s Budget crisis of 1911 led to the passing of the *Parliament Act *, which severely reduced the ability of the House of Lords to block money bills. I don’t know about the Canadian situation. However given that the Senate there is appointed, and not elected as in Australia, I expect that the Canadian Senate’s ability to block money bills is probably not as strong as the Australian Senate’s.
There are additional constitutional provisions to allow the deadlock between the two houses to be settled. The problem is that these provisions (a double dissolution of both houses of parliament and a further election) require six months or so to play out. And in 1975, the government did not have 6 months’ funding up its sleeve. So the the battle lines were drawn. The government relied on its majority in the House and decided to sit out the crisis. It was confident that the opposition would fold under pressure at the last minute and pass the supply bills, especially as there was growing community concern at the '“deviousness” and “not according to political convention” nature of the opposition’s tactics.
The opposition took the line that a government that could not get basic legislation like supply bills passed was no longer in a position to govern. It pointed to the Constitution, and the strong powers given to the Senate. It argued that those powers existed for a reason and that therefore it was not “against convention” to effectively hold the government to ransom, even if no opposition had done so before. The opposition also relied on the unpopularity of the government and the general economic malaise to win support for its actions.
Nobody knows what would have happened had the situation been allowed to continue. Even now historians and legal and political scholars argue heatedly about which side would have cracked first. In the end the Governor-General stepped in, using his reserve powers as representative of the Crown. He:
- sacked the PM Whitlam, who still had a majority in the House; and then
- commissioned the opposition leader Fraser as PM - who did not have a majority in the House - on condition that the first thing that Fraser did as PM would be to ask for a double dissolution.
The subsequent election campaign was emotive and divisive and passions still run hot on the subject even today. Whitlam and the Labor party basically ran a “we wuz robbed” campaign, calling on voters to return them to power and uphold a government’s constitutional right to retain power as long as it could command a majority in the House. The Liberal party under Fraser ran a campaign focussing on the ineptitude of the Labor government and all of the scandals it had suffered.
The final result was an overwhelming victory, in both houses, for the Liberals under Fraser. In the end the voters went for the economy over the constitutional/politial niceties.
You don’t say. When it comes to electoral circuses the USA is fucking Cirque du Soleil. 
Now if only you could get your congresspeople to settle political issues with fisticuffs, like other civilized nations, everything would be just perfect.