1.
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
2.
Aldershot (UK Parliament constituency)
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Aldershot /ˈɔːldərˌʃɒt/ is a constituency in Hampshire, created in 1918 represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 1997 by Sir Gerald Howarth of the Conservative Party. Aldershot has elected Conservative MPs since its creation in 1918, since 1974 the Liberal Democrats or its predecessor the Liberals have finished second in every election — other than the 2015 general election when the Labour candidate was the runner-up. The 2015 result made the seat the 123rd safest of the Conservative Partys 331 seats by percentage of majority. The incumbent since 1997, Howarth, was the MP for Cannock, 1918-1950, The Urban Districts of Aldershot, Farnborough, and Fleet, and the Rural District of Hartley Wintney. 1950-1974, The Municipal Borough of Aldershot, the Urban Districts of Farnborough and Fleet, and the Rural District of Hartley Wintney. 1983-1997, The Borough of Rushmoor, and the District of Hart wards of Eversley, Frogmore and Darby Green, Hartley Wintney, Hawley, Whitewater, Yateley East, Yateley North, and Yateley West. 1997-2010, The Borough of Rushmoor and the wards above less Eversley, Hartley Wintney, 2010–present, The Borough of Rushmoor, and the District of Hart wards of Blackwater and Hawley, and Frogmore and Darby Green. Aldershot is a training and residential base of the British Army. Endorsed by Coalition Government List of Parliamentary constituencies in Hampshire Notes References
3.
Gerald Howarth
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Sir James Gerald Douglas Howarth, known as Gerald Howarth, is a British Conservative Party politician. He has been the Member of Parliament for Aldershot since 1997, having been the MP for Cannock and he was the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of Defence as Minister for International Security Strategy from May 2010 to September 2012. He is currently chairman of Conservative Way Forward, the son of James and Mary Howarth, he was educated at Bloxham School and the University of Southampton, and married in 1973, Elizabeth Jane, née Squibb. They have two sons and a daughter, a qualified private pilot, he was commissioned into the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve as an acting pilot officer in 1968, serving until late 1969. Twenty years later, in 1988, he received the Britannia Airways Parliamentary Pilot of the Year Award, in 1971 was employed by the Bank of America International Ltd. where he remained until 1977, when he moved to the European Arab Bank until 1981. He then became the Syndication Manager for the Standard Chartered Bank for the two years, after which he was first elected to parliament. Howarth was General Secretary of the Society for Individual Freedom, a pressure group and he was also once an active member of the Conservative Monday Club while at university. From 1973 to 1977 he was Director of the Freedom Under The Law Group and he served as an elected councillor on the London Borough of Hounslow from 1982 to 1983, and sat on its Environmental Planning, and Finance and General Purposes Committees. He left Parliament for five years, but was re-elected at the 1997 United Kingdom general election as MP for Aldershot. Howarth was Parliamentary Private Secretary to Michael Spicer when Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Energy 1987-90, allegations of far-right sympathies were made against Howarth in a controversial January 1984 Panorama programme, Maggies Militant Tendency. Howarth and his close friend Neil Hamilton both successfully sued the BBC and were each awarded £20,000 damages for libel in October 1986, the prosecution was sponsored by a right-wing group called the Society for Individual Freedom which Howarth was the general secretary of after leaving university. According to MP John Mann, Howarth and Francis Bennion set up an organisation to counter anti-apartheid called Freedom Under Law and he questioned the conclusion of the Macpherson report that the Metropolitan police are institutionally racist as a grotesque over-reaction. In 2005, he said about Muslims, If they dont like our way of life, there is a remedy, go to another country. There are plenty of other countries whose way of life would appear to be conducive to what they aspire to. They would be happy and we would be happy. the cross is a modest symbol and it is not an aggressive or provocative gesture. It is a demonstration of faith. Clearly, the arrival of so many people of faith has presented a challenge, as so many of us, including the late Enoch Powell. Howarth is known for his views on limited immigration, and antipathy towards gay rights, Howarth claimed that Avila da Silva was merely Mandelsons consort and was less deserving of citizenship than others
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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
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Alma mater
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Alma mater is an allegorical Latin phrase for a university or college. In modern usage, it is a school or university which an individual has attended, the phrase is variously translated as nourishing mother, nursing mother, or fostering mother, suggesting that a school provides intellectual nourishment to its students. Before its modern usage, Alma mater was a title in Latin for various mother goddesses, especially Ceres or Cybele. The source of its current use is the motto, Alma Mater Studiorum, of the oldest university in continuous operation in the Western world and it is related to the term alumnus, denoting a university graduate, which literally means a nursling or one who is nourished. The phrase can also denote a song or hymn associated with a school, although alma was a common epithet for Ceres, Cybele, Venus, and other mother goddesses, it was not frequently used in conjunction with mater in classical Latin. Alma Redemptoris Mater is a well-known 11th century antiphon devoted to Mary, the earliest documented English use of the term to refer to a university is in 1600, when University of Cambridge printer John Legate began using an emblem for the universitys press. In English etymological reference works, the first university-related usage is often cited in 1710, many historic European universities have adopted Alma Mater as part of the Latin translation of their official name. The University of Bologna Latin name, Alma Mater Studiorum, refers to its status as the oldest continuously operating university in the world. At least one, the Alma Mater Europaea in Salzburg, Austria, the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, has been called the Alma Mater of the Nation because of its ties to the founding of the United States. At Queens University in Kingston, Ontario, and the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, the ancient Roman world had many statues of the Alma Mater, some still extant. Modern sculptures are found in prominent locations on several American university campuses, outside the United States, there is an Alma Mater sculpture on the steps of the monumental entrance to the Universidad de La Habana, in Havana, Cuba. Media related to Alma mater at Wikimedia Commons The dictionary definition of alma mater at Wiktionary Alma Mater Europaea website
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SOAS, University of London
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SOAS University of London, is a public research university in London, England, and a constituent college of the University of London. Founded in 1916, SOAS was ranked within the top 30 universities in the United Kingdom by The Guardian University Guide 2017, the School is organised into faculties of humanities, languages and social sciences. It is home to the SOAS School of Law, SOAS offers around 350 undergraduate bachelors degree combinations, over 100 one-year masters degrees and PhD programmes in nearly every department. SOAS has produced several heads of states, government ministers, diplomats, Supreme Court judges, the School of Oriental Studies was founded in 1916 at 2 Finsbury Circus, London, the then premises of the London Institution. The school received its charter on 5 June 1916 and admitted its first students on 18 January 1917. The school was inaugurated a month later on 23 February 1917 by King George V. Among those in attendance were Earl Curzon of Kedleston, formerly Viceroy of India, the School of Oriental Studies was founded by the British state as an instrument to strengthen Britains political, commercial and military presence in Asia and Africa. The school immediately became integral in training British administrators, colonial officials, Africa was added to the schools name in 1938. Its move to new premises in Bloomsbury was held up by delays in construction, with the onset of the Second World War, many University of London colleges were evacuated from London in 1939 and billeted on universities all over the provinces. The School was, on the Governments advice, transferred to Christs College, Cambridge. In 1940, when it became apparent that a return to London was possible, in 1942, the War Office joined with the schools Japanese department to help alleviate the shortage in Japanese linguists. State scholarships were offered to select grammar and public school boys to train as military translators, lodged at Dulwich College in south London, the students became affectionately known as the Dulwich boys. The courses were directed by army cryptographer, Col. John Tiltman, the SOAS School of Law was established in 1947 with Professor Vesey-Fitzgerald as its first head. Growth however was curtailed by following years of austerity, and upon Sir Cyril Philips assuming the directorship in 1956. Over his twenty-year stewardship, Phillips transformed the school, raising funds, a college of the University of London, the Schools fields include Law, Social Sciences, Humanities and Languages with special reference to Asia and Africa. The SOAS Library, located in the Philips Building, is the UKs national resource for materials relating to Asia and Africa and is the largest of its kind in the world. The school has grown considerably over the past thirty years, from fewer than 1,000 students in the 1970s to more than 6,000 students today, nearly half of them postgraduates. SOAS is partnered with the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales in Paris which is considered the French equivalent of SOAS
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Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
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The Academys stated aim is to be the national centre of excellence for leadership. All British Army officers, including officers who were previously Warrant Officers. The Academy is the British Army equivalent of the Britannia Royal Naval College Dartmouth, Royal Air Force College Cranwell, despite its name, The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst is located in Camberley, the boundaries of the academy straddle the counties of Berkshire and Surrey. The county border is marked by a stream known as the Wish Stream. The main entrance is located on the east of the Academy, the nearest railway station is Camberley. The present Royal Military Academy Sandhurst was founded in 1947 with the merger of two institutions, the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. The first Military Academy had been established in 1720 at Woolwich, known as the Shop, this academy moved to a permanent site at Woolwich Common in 1806 and was granted royal status in 1841. In 1806, the Military Academy took on the training of Royal Engineers officer cadets and, later, coincidentally,1802 was also the year of foundation of Saint-Cyr in France and of West Point in the United States. In 1812 the Junior Department of the Royal Military College moved from Great Marlow into buildings designed by James Wyatt at Sandhurst. A few years later, the Junior Department was joined at Sandhurst from High Wycombe by the Senior Department, which in 1858 became a separate institution, in 1984, the Womens Officer Training College Bagshot moved to Sandhurst. In 1992 a new Commissioning Course finally unified the training of male, female, the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst Collection illustrates the history of the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, and the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. The collection includes the Gentlemen Cadet registers, historic archives, uniforms, paintings, photographs, for the 1948 Summer Olympics in London, the newly created Academy hosted the running leg of the modern pentathlon competition. Contemporary training at Sandhurst was the subject of a television series, first broadcast by BBC television in October 2011. In 2012 Sandhurst accepted a £15 million donation from the government of United Arab Emirates for the Zayed Building, an accommodation block, named after the UAEs founding ruler. In 2013 Sandhurst accepted a donation of £3 million from the government of Bahrain for the refurbishment of Mons Hall and it was renamed as King Hamad Hall in honour of the King of Bahrain, which generated some controversy in the United Kingdom. In 2015 Sandhurst appointed Lucy Giles as the first female commander in its history. Potential officers are identified by the Army Officer Selection Board situated in Westbury in Wiltshire, nearly 10 percent of British cadets are female and nearly 10 percent of all cadets come from overseas. More than eighty percent of entrants are university graduates, although a degree is not required for admission, the course is accredited by various academic and professional institutions
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United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
United Kingdom
British Army