1.
George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen
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The Aberdeen ministry was filled with powerful and talented politicians, whom Aberdeen was largely unable to control and direct. Despite trying to avoid this happening, it took Britain into the Crimean War, aberdeens career was dominated by foreign policy, but his experience did not prevent the slide towards the Crimean War. His personal life was marked by the loss of parents by the time he was eleven, and of his first wife after only seven years of a happy marriage. His daughters died young, and his relations with his sons were difficult, before his marriage he travelled extensively in Europe, including Greece, and he had a serious interest in the classical civilisations and their archaeology. On his return to Britain in 1805 he devoted much time, after the death of his wife in 1812 he became a diplomat, almost immediately being given the important embassy to Vienna while still in his twenties. After holding the position for two years, followed by another role, by 1841 his experience led to his appointment as Foreign Secretary again under Robert Peel for a longer term. This was despite his being a bad speaker, which mattered far less in the House of Lords. Nonetheless his Peelite colleague, later himself Prime Minister, William Ewart Gladstone, I have loved others, but never like him. Born in Edinburgh on 28 January 1784, he was the eldest son of George Gordon, Lord Haddo, son of George Gordon and his mother was Charlotte, youngest daughter of William Baird of Newbyth. He lost his father in 1791 and his mother in 1795 and was brought up by Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville and he was educated at Harrow, and St Johns College, Cambridge, where he graduated with a Master of Arts in 1804. Before this, however, he had become Earl of Aberdeen on his grandfathers death in 1801, on his return to England, he founded the Athenian Society. In 1805, he married Lady Catherine Elizabeth, daughter of John Hamilton, in December 1805 Lord Aberdeen took his seat as a Tory Scottish representative peer in the House of Lords. In 1808, he was created a Knight of the Thistle, following the death of his wife from tuberculosis in 1812 he joined the Foreign Service. He was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Austria, in the company of the Austrian Emperor, Francis II he was an observer at the decisive Coalition victory of the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, he had met Napoleon in his earlier travels. Aberdeen was greatly affected by the aftermath of war which he witnessed at first hand and he wrote home, The near approach of war and its effects are horrible beyond what you can conceive. The whole road from Prague to was covered with full of wounded, dead. The shock and disgust and pity produced by such scenes are beyond what I could have supposed possible. the scenes of distress, I have been quite haunted by them. Returning home he was created a peer of the United Kingdom as Viscount Gordon, of Aberdeen in the County of Aberdeen, and made a member of the Privy Council
2.
Queen Victoria
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Victoria was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she adopted the title of Empress of India. Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn, both the Duke of Kent and King George III died in 1820, and Victoria was raised under close supervision by her German-born mother Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She inherited the throne aged 18, after her fathers three brothers had all died, leaving no surviving legitimate children. The United Kingdom was already a constitutional monarchy, in which the sovereign held relatively little direct political power. Privately, Victoria attempted to influence government policy and ministerial appointments, publicly, Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, tying them together, after Alberts death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances. As a result of her seclusion, republicanism temporarily gained strength and her Golden and Diamond Jubilees were times of public celebration. Her reign of 63 years and seven months is known as the Victorian era and it was a period of industrial, cultural, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom, and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. She was the last British monarch of the House of Hanover and her son and successor, Edward VII, belonged to the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the line of his father. Victorias father was Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn, until 1817, Edwards niece, Princess Charlotte of Wales, was the only legitimate grandchild of George III. Her death in 1817 precipitated a crisis that brought pressure on the Duke of Kent. In 1818 he married Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, a widowed German princess with two children—Carl and Feodora —by her first marriage to the Prince of Leiningen and her brother Leopold was Princess Charlottes widower. The Duke and Duchess of Kents only child, Victoria, was born at 4.15 a. m. on 24 May 1819 at Kensington Palace in London. Victoria was christened privately by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Manners-Sutton, on 24 June 1819 in the Cupola Room at Kensington Palace and she was baptised Alexandrina, after one of her godparents, Emperor Alexander I of Russia, and Victoria, after her mother. Additional names proposed by her parents—Georgina, Charlotte, and Augusta—were dropped on the instructions of the Dukes eldest brother, George, the Duke of Clarence and the Duke of Kent married on the same day in 1818, but both of Clarences daughters died as infants. Victorias father died in January 1820, when Victoria was less than a year old, a week later her grandfather died and was succeeded by his eldest son, George IV. The Duke of York died in 1827, when George IV died in 1830, he was succeeded by his next surviving brother, William IV, and Victoria became heir presumptive
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Conservative Party (UK)
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The Conservative Party, officially the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a political party in the United Kingdom. It is currently the party, having won a majority of seats in the House of Commons at the 2015 general election. The partys leader, Theresa May, is serving as Prime Minister. It is the largest party in government with 8,702 councillors. The Conservative Party is one of the two major political parties in the United Kingdom, the other being its modern rival. The Conservative Partys platform involves support for market capitalism, free enterprise, fiscal conservatism, a strong national defence, deregulation. In the 1920s, the Liberal vote greatly diminished and the Labour Party became the Conservatives main rivals, Conservative Prime Ministers led governments for 57 years of the twentieth century, including Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. Thatchers tenure led to wide-ranging economic liberalisation, the Conservative Partys domination of British politics throughout the twentieth century has led to them being referred to as one of the most successful political parties in the Western world. The Conservatives are the joint-second largest British party in the European Parliament, with twenty MEPs, the party is a member of the Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe Europarty and the International Democrat Union. The party is the second-largest in the Scottish Parliament and the second-largest in the Welsh Assembly, the party is also organised in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. The Conservative Party traces its origins to a faction, rooted in the 18th century Whig Party and they were known as Independent Whigs, Friends of Mr Pitt, or Pittites. After Pitts death the term Tory came into use and this was an allusion to the Tories, a political grouping that had existed from 1678, but which had no organisational continuity with the Pittite party. From about 1812 on the name Tory was commonly used for the newer party, the term Conservative was suggested as a title for the party by a magazine article by J. Wilson Croker in the Quarterly Review in 1830. The name immediately caught on and was adopted under the aegis of Sir Robert Peel around 1834. Peel is acknowledged as the founder of the Conservative Party, which he created with the announcement of the Tamworth Manifesto, the term Conservative Party rather than Tory was the dominant usage by 1845. In 1912, the Liberal Unionists merged with the Conservative Party, in Ireland, the Irish Unionist Alliance had been formed in 1891 which merged anti-Home Rule Unionists into one political movement. Its MPs took the Conservative whip at Westminster, and in essence formed the Irish wing of the party until 1922. The Conservatives served with the Liberals in an all-party coalition government during World War I, keohane finds that the Conservatives were bitterly divided before 1914, especially on the issue of Irish Unionism and the experience of three consecutive election losses
4.
Benjamin Disraeli
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Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS was a British politician and writer who twice served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He played a role in the creation of the modern Conservative Party, defining its policies. Disraeli is remembered for his voice in world affairs, his political battles with the Liberal Party leader William Ewart Gladstone. He made the Conservatives the party most identified with the glory and he is the only British Prime Minister of Jewish birth. Disraeli was born in Bloomsbury, then part of Middlesex and his father left Judaism after a dispute at his synagogue, young Benjamin became an Anglican at the age of 12. After several unsuccessful attempts, Disraeli entered the House of Commons in 1837, in 1846 the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel split the party over his proposal to repeal the Corn Laws, which involved ending the tariff on imported grain. Disraeli clashed with Peel in the Commons, Disraeli became a major figure in the party. When Lord Derby, the party leader, thrice formed governments in the 1850s and 1860s and he also forged a bitter rivalry with Gladstone of the Liberal Party. Upon Derbys retirement in 1868, Disraeli became Prime Minister briefly before losing that years election and he returned to opposition, before leading the party to a majority in the 1874 election. He maintained a friendship with Queen Victoria, who in 1876 created him Earl of Beaconsfield. Disraelis second term was dominated by the Eastern Question—the slow decay of the Ottoman Empire, Disraeli arranged for the British to purchase a major interest in the Suez Canal Company. This diplomatic victory over Russia established Disraeli as one of Europes leading statesmen, World events thereafter moved against the Conservatives. Controversial wars in Afghanistan and South Africa undermined his public support and he angered British farmers by refusing to reinstitute the Corn Laws in response to poor harvests and cheap imported grain. With Gladstone conducting a speaking campaign, his Liberals bested Disraelis Conservatives in the 1880 election. In his final months, Disraeli led the Conservatives in opposition and he had throughout his career written novels, beginning in 1826, and he published his last completed novel, Endymion, shortly before he died at the age of 76. Disraeli was born on 21 December 1804 at 6 Kings Road, Bedford Row, Bloomsbury, London, the child and eldest son of Isaac DIsraeli, a literary critic and historian. The family was of Sephardic Jewish Italian mercantile background, All Disraelis grandparents and great grandparents were born in Italy, Isaacs father, Benjamin, moved to England from Venice in 1748. Disraelis siblings were Sarah, Naphtali, Ralph, and James and he was close to his sister, and on affectionate but more distant terms with his surviving brothers
5.
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
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The House of Commons of the United Kingdom is the lower house of the countrys parliament. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The House is a body consisting of 650 members known as Members of Parliament. Members are elected to represent constituencies by first-past-the-post and hold their seats until Parliament is dissolved, under the Parliament Act 1911, the Lords power to reject legislation was reduced to a delaying power. The Government is primarily responsible to the House of Commons and the prime minister stays in office only as long as he or she retains the support of a majority of its members. Although it does not formally elect the prime minister, the position of the parties in the House of Commons is of overriding importance, by convention, the prime minister is answerable to, and must maintain the support of, the House of Commons. Since 1963, by convention, the minister is always a member of the House of Commons. The Commons may indicate its lack of support for the Government by rejecting a motion of confidence or by passing a motion of no confidence, confidence and no confidence motions are sometimes phrased explicitly, for instance, That this House has no confidence in Her Majestys Government. Many other motions were considered confidence issues, even though not explicitly phrased as such, in particular, important bills that form a part of the Governments agenda were formerly considered matters of confidence, as is the annual Budget. Parliament normally sits for a term of five years. Subject to that limit, the minister could formerly choose the timing of the dissolution of parliament. By this second mechanism, the government of the United Kingdom can change without a general election. In such circumstances there may not even have been a party leadership election, as the new leader may be chosen by acclaim. A prime minister may resign if he or she is not defeated at the polls. In such a case, the premiership goes to whoever can command a majority in the House of Commons, in practice this is usually the new leader of the outgoing prime ministers party. Until 1965, the Conservative Party had no mechanism for electing a new leader, when Anthony Eden resigned as PM in 1957 without recommending a successor and it fell to the Queen to appoint Harold Macmillan as the new prime minister, after taking the advice of ministers. By convention, all ministers must be members of the House of Commons or of the House of Lords, a handful have been appointed who were outside Parliament, but in most cases they then entered Parliament either in a by-election or by receiving a peerage. Since 1902, all ministers have been members of the Commons
6.
House of Lords
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The House of Lords of the United Kingdom, referred to ceremonially as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. Unlike the elected House of Commons, all members of the House of Lords are appointed, the membership of the House of Lords is drawn from the peerage and is made up of Lords Spiritual and Lords Temporal. The Lords Spiritual are 26 bishops in the established Church of England, of the Lords Temporal, the majority are life peers who are appointed by the monarch on the advice of the Prime Minister, or on the advice of the House of Lords Appointments Commission. However, they include some hereditary peers including four dukes. Very few of these are female since most hereditary peerages can only be inherited by men, while the House of Commons has a defined 650-seat membership, the number of members in the House of Lords is not fixed. There are currently 805 sitting Lords, the House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament to be larger than its respective lower house. The House of Lords scrutinises bills that have approved by the House of Commons. It regularly reviews and amends Bills from the Commons, while it is unable to prevent Bills passing into law, except in certain limited circumstances, it can delay Bills and force the Commons to reconsider their decisions. In this capacity, the House of Lords acts as a check on the House of Commons that is independent from the electoral process, Bills can be introduced into either the House of Lords or the House of Commons. Members of the Lords may also take on roles as government ministers, the House of Lords has its own support services, separate from the Commons, including the House of Lords Library. The Queens Speech is delivered in the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament, the House also has a Church of England role, in that Church Measures must be tabled within the House by the Lords Spiritual. This new parliament was, in effect, the continuation of the Parliament of England with the addition of 45 MPs and 16 Peers to represent Scotland, the Parliament of England developed from the Magnum Concilium, the Great Council that advised the King during medieval times. This royal council came to be composed of ecclesiastics, noblemen, the first English Parliament is often considered to be the Model Parliament, which included archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, barons, and representatives of the shires and boroughs of it. The power of Parliament grew slowly, fluctuating as the strength of the monarchy grew or declined, for example, during much of the reign of Edward II, the nobility was supreme, the Crown weak, and the shire and borough representatives entirely powerless. In 1569, the authority of Parliament was for the first time recognised not simply by custom or royal charter, further developments occurred during the reign of Edward IIs successor, Edward III. It was during this Kings reign that Parliament clearly separated into two chambers, the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The authority of Parliament continued to grow, and, during the fifteenth century
7.
Whigs (British political party)
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The Whigs were a political faction and then a political party in the parliaments of England, Scotland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom. Between the 1680s and 1850s, they contested power with their rivals, the Whigs origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute monarchy. The Whigs played a role in the Glorious Revolution of 1688, and were the standing enemies of the Stuart kings and pretenders. The Whigs took full control of the government in 1715, and remained dominant until King George III, coming to the throne in 1760. The Whig Supremacy was enabled by the Hanoverian succession of George I in 1714, the Whigs thoroughly purged the Tories from all major positions in government, the army, the Church of England, the legal profession, and local offices. The Partys hold on power was so strong and durable, historians call the period from roughly 1714 to 1783 the age of the Whig Oligarchy. The first great leader of the Whigs was Robert Walpole, who maintained control of the government through the period 1721–1742, his protégé was Henry Pelham, who led from 1743 to 1754. Both parties were founded on rich politicians, more than on votes, there were elections to the House of Commons. The Whig Party slowly evolved during the 18th century, later on, the Whigs drew support from the emerging industrial interests and wealthy merchants, while the Tories drew support from the landed interests and the royal family. The term Whig was originally short for whiggamor, a term meaning cattle driver used to describe western Scots who came to Leith for corn. In the reign of Charles I the term was used during Wars of the Three Kingdoms to refer derisively to a faction of the Scottish Covenanters who called themselves the Kirk Party. It was then applied to Scottish Presbyterian rebels who were against the Kings Episcopalian order in Scotland, Whig was a term of abuse applied to those who wanted to exclude James on the grounds that he was a Roman Catholic. The fervent Tory Samuel Johnson often joked that the first Whig was the Devil, the Whigs, under Lord Shaftesburys leadership, wished to exclude the Duke of York from the throne due to his Catholicism, his favouring of monarchical absolutism and his connections to France. They believed the Duke, if allowed to inherit the throne, would endanger the Protestant religion, liberty, the first Exclusion Bill was supported by a substantial majority on its second reading in May 1679. In response, King Charles prorogued Parliament and then dissolved it and this new parliament did not meet for thirteen months, because Charles wanted to give passions a chance to die down. When it met in October 1680, an Exclusion Bill was introduced and passed in the Commons without major resistance, Charles dissolved Parliament in January 1681, but the Whigs did not suffer serious losses in the ensuing election. The next Parliament first met in March, at Oxford, but Charles dissolved it only after a few days, when he made an appeal to the country against the Whigs, and determined to rule without Parliament. In February, Charles had made a deal with the French King Louis XIV, without Parliament, the Whigs gradually crumbled, mainly due to the Rye House Plot
8.
Crimean War
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The Crimean War was a military conflict fought from October 1853 to March 1856 in which the Russian Empire lost to an alliance of France, Britain, the Ottoman Empire, and Sardinia. The immediate cause involved the rights of Christian minorities in the Holy Land, the French promoted the rights of Roman Catholics, while Russia promoted those of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The longer-term causes involved the decline of the Ottoman Empire and the unwillingness of Britain and France to allow Russia to gain territory and power at Ottoman expense. While the churches eventually worked out their differences and came to an agreement, Nicholas I of Russia, Nicholas issued an ultimatum that the Orthodox subjects of the Empire be placed under his protection. Britain attempted to mediate and arranged a compromise that Nicholas agreed to, when the Ottomans demanded changes, Nicholas refused and prepared for war. Having obtained promises of support from France and Britain, the Ottomans declared war on Russia in October 1853. The war started in the Balkans, when Russian troops occupied the Danubian Principalities, until then under Ottoman suzerainty and now part of modern Romania, led by Omar Pasha, the Ottomans fought a strong defensive campaign and stopped the advance at Silistra. A separate action on the town of Kars in eastern Anatolia led to a siege. Fearing an Ottoman collapse, France and Britain rushed forces to Gallipoli and they then moved north to Varna in June, arriving just in time for the Russians to abandon Silistra. Aside from a skirmish at Köstence, there was little for the allies to do. Karl Marx quipped that there they are, the French doing nothing, after extended preparations, the forces landed on the peninsula in September 1854 and fought their way to a point south of Sevastopol after a series of successful battles. The Russians counterattacked on 25 October in what became the Battle of Balaclava and were repulsed, a second counterattack, ordered personally by Nicholas, was defeated by Omar Pasha. The front settled into a siege and led to conditions for troops on both sides. Smaller actions were carried out in the Baltic, the Caucasus, Sevastopol fell after eleven months, and neutral countries began to join the Allied cause. Isolated and facing a bleak prospect of invasion from the west if the war continued and this was welcomed by France and Britain, as their subjects were beginning to turn against their governments as the war dragged on. The war was ended by the Treaty of Paris, signed on 30 March 1856, Russia was forbidden from hosting warships in the Black Sea. The Ottoman vassal states of Wallachia and Moldavia became largely independent, Christians there were granted a degree of official equality, and the Orthodox Church regained control of the Christian churches in dispute. The Crimean War was one of the first conflicts to use technologies such as explosive naval shells, railways
9.
Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston
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Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, KG, GCB, PC, FRS was a British statesman who served twice as Prime Minister in the mid-19th century. For most of 1830 to 1865 he dominated British foreign policy when Britain was at the height of her power and he succeeded to his fathers Irish peerage in 1802. He became a Tory MP in 1807, and was made Secretary at War in 1809 and he held the job until 1828, entering the cabinet in 1827 when George Canning became Prime Minister. Less than a later he resigned with other Canningites. In opposition he switched his focus to foreign policy, and he was Foreign Secretary when the Whigs were in power, dealing with a succession of crises in Europe and beyond. Some of his actions, now sometimes termed liberal interventionist, were highly controversial at the time. In 1852 he became Home Secretary in Aberdeens coalition government, the Peelites having insisted on Russell getting the Foreign Office and he passed various social reforms but opposed electoral ones. He had two periods in office, 1855–1858 and 1859–1865, before dying at almost 81, a few months after winning an election with an increased majority. He remains, to date, the last Prime Minister to die in office and his policies regarding India, Italy, Belgium and Spain had long-term impact, while his policies toward France, the Ottoman Empire, and the United States proved more ephemeral. He was a master of public opinion, achieved by stroking British nationalism and his weaknesses include mishandling of personal relations, and long-standing disagreements with the Queen over the royal role in determining foreign policy. Palmerston built a popular following among the British electorate, by promoting himself, British nationalism. He assiduously fostered the press, which gave him very favourable coverage, Queen Victoria and most of the political leadership distrusted him, but his popular strength prevailed. Henry John Temple was born in his familys Westminster house to the Irish branch of the Temple family on 20 October 1784, Henry was to become the 3rd Viscount Palmerston. His family derived their title from the Peerage of Ireland and his father was Henry Temple, 2nd Viscount Palmerston, and his mother Mary, daughter of Benjamin Mee, a London merchant. From 1792 to 1794, the young future Lord Palmerston accompanied his family on a long Continental tour, whilst in Italy Palmerston acquired an Italian tutor, who taught him to speak and write fluent Italian. He was educated at Harrow School, admiral Sir Augustus Clifford, 1st Bt. was a fag to Palmerston, Viscount Althorp and Viscount Duncannon and later remembered Palmerston as by far the most merciful of the three. Palmerston was often engaged in fights and fellow Old Harrovians remembered Palmerston as someone who stood up to bullies twice his size. Palmerstons father took him to the House of Commons in 1799, Palmerston was then at the University of Edinburgh, where he learnt political economy from Dugald Stewart, a friend of the Scottish philosophers Adam Ferguson and Adam Smith
10.
Leader of the House of Lords
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The Leader of the House of Lords is a member of the Cabinet of the United Kingdom who is responsible for arranging government business in the House of Lords. The role is held in combination with a formal Cabinet position, usually one of the sinecure offices of Lord President of the Council. Unless the Leader is also a minister, being Leader constitutes the bulk of his or her government responsibilities. The Office of the Leader of the House of Lords is a ministerial department, though the Leader of the House is a member of the cabinet and remains a partisan figure, he or she also has responsibilities to the House as a whole. In contrast to the House of Commons, where proceedings are controlled by the Speaker, proceedings in the Lords are controlled by peers themselves, under the rules set out in the Standing Orders. The Leader is often called upon to advise on procedures and points of order, however, like the Lord Speaker, the Leader of the House has no power to rule on points of order or to intervene during an inappropriate speech. Those functions were transferred to the Lord Speaker, however, it may have been used as early as 1689, applied to George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, when he was Speaker of the House of Lords during the Convention Parliament of that year. The role developed during the first quarter of the century, at the same time as the role of Prime Minister. It was therefore necessary for a member of the government to take responsibility for steering government legislation through each House, the Earl of Sunderland, initiated aspects of the role during the Whig Junta under Queen Anne. Sunderland and the other Whigs were dismissed from office in reaction to their co-ordination of government matters, Sunderland returned to power under George I, as Lord Privy Seal. When the Prime Minister sat in the House of Lords, which was common until the beginning of the twentieth century, when the Prime Minister sat in the Commons, the position of Leader of the Lords was often held by the Foreign Secretary or Colonial Secretary. In some coalition governments, it was held by the party leader who was not Prime Minister, since the end of the Marquess of Salisburys last government, in 1902, the position clearly exists in its own right as a member of the cabinet. The first female Leader of the Lords was Janet Young, Baroness Young in 1981–1983, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury served as Leader of the House of Lords from 1885 to 1886, from 1886 to 1892 and from 1895 to 1902. His son James Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th Marquess of Salisbury served as Leader from 1925 to 1929 and his grandson, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury, served as Leader from 1994 to 1997, as Viscount Cranborne, again by means of a writ of acceleration. Douglas Hogg, 1st Viscount Hailsham served as Leader of the House of Lords from 1931 to 1935 and his son Quintin Hogg, 2nd Viscount Hailsham served as Leader from 1960 to 1963. Because the post is a one and not a ministerial office in its own right, it is not always included in official lists of government offices. This can make it difficult to determine who the Leader of the House of Lords was in a particular ministry, House of Lords Leader of the House of Commons Leader of the House of Lords Official site
11.
Lord Chancellor
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The Lord Chancellor, formally the Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, is a senior functionary in the government of the United Kingdom. They are appointed by the Sovereign on the advice of the Prime Minister, the Lord Chancellor is the second highest ranking of the Great Officers of State, ranking after only the Lord High Steward. Prior to the Union there were separate Lords Chancellor for England and Wales, the Lord Chancellor is a member of the Cabinet and, by law, is responsible for the efficient functioning and independence of the courts. In 2007 there were a number of changes to the legal system, the current Lord Chancellor is Elizabeth Truss, who is also Secretary of State for Justice. One of the Lord Chancellors responsibilities is to act as the custodian of the Great Seal of the Realm, a Lord Keeper of the Great Seal may be appointed instead of a Lord Chancellor. The two offices entail exactly the same duties, the distinction is in the mode of appointment. The seal is then said to be in commission, since the 19th century, however, only Lord Chancellors have been appointed, the other offices having fallen into disuse. The office of Lord Chancellor of England may trace its origins to the Carolingian monarchy, in England, the office dates at least as far back as the Norman Conquest, and possibly earlier. Some give the first Chancellor of England as Angmendus, in 605, other sources suggest that the first to appoint a Chancellor was Edward the Confessor, who is said to have adopted the practice of sealing documents instead of personally signing them. A clerk of Edwards, Regenbald, was named chancellor in some documents from Edwards reign, in any event, the office has been continuously occupied since the Norman Conquest. The chancellor headed the office or chancery. Formerly, the Lord Chancellor was almost always a churchman, as during the Middle Ages the clergy were amongst the few men of the realm. The Lord Chancellor performed multiple functions—he was the Keeper of the Great Seal, the royal chaplain. Thus, the position emerged as one of the most important ones in government and he was only outranked in government by the Justiciar. As one of the Kings ministers, the Lord Chancellor attended the curia regis or Royal Court, if a bishop, the Lord Chancellor received a writ of summons, if an ecclesiastic of a lower degree or, if a layman, he attended without any summons. The curia regis would later evolve into Parliament, the Lord Chancellor becoming the prolocutor of its upper house, as was confirmed by a statute passed during the reign of Henry VIII, a Lord Chancellor could preside over the House of Lords even if not a Lord himself. The Lord Chancellors judicial duties also evolved through his role in the curia regis, petitions for justice were normally addressed to the King and the curia, but in 1280, Edward I instructed his justices to examine and deal with petitions themselves as the Court of Kings Bench. Important petitions were to be sent to the Lord Chancellor for his decision, by the reign of Edward III, this chancellery function developed into a separate tribunal for the Lord Chancellor
12.
Lord President of the Council
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The Lord President of the Council is the fourth of the Great Officers of State of the United Kingdom, ranking beneath the Lord High Treasurer and above the Lord Privy Seal. The Lord President usually attends and is responsible of presiding over meetings of the Privy Council, in the modern era, the holder is by convention always a member of one of the houses of Parliament and the office is a Cabinet post. The Lord President is currently David Lidington as of 14 July 2016, the Privy Council meets once a month, wherever the Sovereign may be residing at the time, to give formal approval to Orders in Council. Only a few Privy Counsellors need attend such meetings, and only invited to do so at the Governments request. As the duties of the Lord President are not onerous, the post has often given to a government minister whose responsibilities are not department-specific. In recent years it has been most typical for the Lord President to also serve as Leader of the House of Commons or Leader of the House of Lords. Before the change of government in 2010, the Lord President was Peter Mandelson, examples of this practice are the meetings in New Zealand in 1990 and 1995, when Geoffrey Palmer and James Bolger respectively were acting Lords President. In the 19th century, the Lord President was generally the cabinet responsible for the education system. This role was gradually scaled back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries but remnants of it remain, a particularly vital role was played by the Lord President of the Council during the Second World War. The Lord President served as chairman of the Lord Presidents Committee and this committee acted as a central clearing house for dealing with the countrys economic problems. This was vital to the running of the British war economy. Winston Churchill, clearly believing that this wartime co-ordinating role was beneficial, introduced a similar, the so-called overlord ministers included Frederick Leathers as Secretary of State for the Co-ordination of Transport, Fuel and Power and Frederick Marquis, 1st Baron Woolton as Lord President. Wooltons job was to co-ordinate the then separate ministries of agriculture, the Lord President has no role in the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. Privy Council Office Vice-President of the Executive Council President of the Queens Privy Council for Canada Sinecure
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