Airport
An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities for commercial air transport. Airports have facilities to store and maintain aircraft, a control tower. An airport consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surface such as a runway for a plane to take off or a helipad, includes adjacent utility buildings such as control towers and terminals. Larger airports may have airport aprons, taxiway bridges, air traffic control centres, passenger facilities such as restaurants and lounges, emergency services. In some countries, the US in particular, they typically have one or more fixed-base operators, serving general aviation. An airport serving helicopters is called a heliport. An airport for use by seaplanes and amphibious aircraft is called a seaplane base; such a base includes a stretch of open water for takeoffs and landings, seaplane docks for tying-up. An international airport has additional facilities for customs and passport control as well as incorporating all of the aforementioned elements.
Such airports rank among the most complex and largest of all built typologies with 15 of the top 50 buildings by floor area being airport terminals. The terms aerodrome and airstrip may be used to refer to airports, the terms heliport, seaplane base, STOLport refer to airports dedicated to helicopters, seaplanes, or short take-off and landing aircraft. In colloquial use in certain environments, the terms airport and aerodrome are interchanged. However, in general, the term airport may imply or confer a certain stature upon the aviation facility that other aerodromes may not have achieved. In some jurisdictions, airport is a legal term of art reserved for those aerodromes certified or licensed as airports by the relevant national aviation authority after meeting specified certification criteria or regulatory requirements; that is to say, all airports are aerodromes, but not all aerodromes are airports. In jurisdictions where there is no legal distinction between aerodrome and airport, which term to use in the name of an aerodrome may be a commercial decision.
In United States technical/legal usage, landing area is used instead of aerodrome, airport means "a landing area used by aircraft for receiving or discharging passengers or cargo". Smaller or less-developed airfields, which represent the vast majority have a single runway shorter than 1,000 m. Larger airports for airline flights have paved runways of 2,000 m or longer. Skyline Airport in Inkom, Idaho has a runway, only 122 m long. In the United States, the minimum dimensions for dry, hard landing fields are defined by the FAR Landing And Takeoff Field Lengths; these include considerations for safety margins during takeoff. The longest public-use runway in the world is at Qamdo Bamda Airport in China, it has a length of 5,500 m. The world's widest paved runway is 105 m wide; as of 2009, the CIA stated that there were 44,000 "... airports or airfields recognizable from the air" around the world, including 15,095 in the US, the US having the most in the world. Most of the world's large airports are owned by local, regional, or national government bodies who lease the airport to private corporations who oversee the airport's operation.
For example, in the United Kingdom the state-owned British Airports Authority operated eight of the nation's major commercial airports – it was subsequently privatized in the late 1980s, following its takeover by the Spanish Ferrovial consortium in 2006, has been further divested and downsized to operating just Heathrow now. Germany's Frankfurt Airport is managed by the quasi-private firm Fraport. While in India GMR Group operates, through joint ventures, Indira Gandhi International Airport and Rajiv Gandhi International Airport. Bengaluru International Airport and Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport are controlled by GVK Group; the rest of India's airports are managed by the Airports Authority of India. In Pakistan nearly all civilian airports are owned and operated by the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority except for Sialkot International Airport which has the distinction of being the first owned public airport in Pakistan and South Asia. In the United States, commercial airports are operated directly by government entities or government-created airport authorities, such as the Los Angeles World Airports authority that oversees several airports in the Greater Los Angeles area, including Los Angeles International Airport.
In Canada, the federal authority, Transport Canada, divested itself of all but the remotest airports in 1999/2000. Now most airports in Canada are owned and operated by individual legal authorities or are municipally owned. Many U. S. airports still lease part or all of their facilities to outside firms, who operate functions such as retail management and parking. In the U. S. all commercial airport runways are certified by the FAA under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 14 Part 139, "Certification of Commercial Service Airports" but maintained by the local airport under the regulatory authority of the FAA. Despite the reluctance to privatize airports in the US, the government-owned, contractor-operated arrangement is the standard for the operation of commercial airports in the rest of the world. Airports are divided into airside areas; the landside area is open to the public, while access to the airside area is controlled. The airside area includes all parts of the airpo
Interstate Highway System
The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways known as the Interstate Highway System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Highway System in the United States; the system is named for President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Construction was authorized by the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, the original portion was completed 35 years although some urban routes were cancelled and never built; the network has since been extended. In 2016, it had a total length of 48,181 miles; as of 2016, about one-quarter of all vehicle miles driven in the country use the Interstate system. In 2006, the cost of construction was estimated at about $425 billion; the United States government's efforts to construct a national network of highways began on an ad hoc basis with the passage of the Federal Aid Road Act of 1916, which provided for $75 million over a five-year period for matching funds to the states for the construction and improvement of highways.
The nation's revenue needs associated with World War I prevented any significant implementation of this policy, which expired in 1921. In December 1918, E. J. Mehren, a civil engineer and the editor of Engineering News-Record, presented his "A Suggested National Highway Policy and Plan" during a gathering of the State Highway Officials and Highway Industries Association at the Congress Hotel in Chicago. In the plan, Mehren proposed a 50,000-mile system, consisting of five east–west routes and 10 north–south routes; the system would include two percent of all roads and would pass through every state at a cost of $25,000 per mile, providing commercial as well as military transport benefits. As the landmark 1916 law expired, new legislation was passed—the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1921; this new road construction initiative once again provided for federal matching funds for road construction and improvement, $75 million allocated annually. Moreover, this new legislation for the first time sought to target these funds to the construction of a national road grid of interconnected "primary highways", setting up cooperation among the various state highway planning boards.
The Bureau of Public Roads asked the Army to provide a list of roads that it considered necessary for national defense. In 1922, General John J. Pershing, former head of the American Expeditionary Force in Europe during the war, complied by submitting a detailed network of 20,000 miles of interconnected primary highways—the so-called Pershing Map. A boom in road construction followed throughout the decade of the 1920s, with such projects as the New York parkway system constructed as part of a new national highway system; as automobile traffic increased, planners saw a need for such an interconnected national system to supplement the existing non-freeway, United States Numbered Highways system. By the late 1930s, planning had expanded to a system of new superhighways. In 1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave Thomas MacDonald, chief at the Bureau of Public Roads, a hand-drawn map of the United States marked with eight superhighway corridors for study. In 1939, Bureau of Public Roads Division of Information chief Herbert S. Fairbank wrote a report called Toll Roads and Free Roads, "the first formal description of what became the interstate highway system" and, in 1944, the themed Interregional Highways.
The Interstate Highway System gained a champion in President Dwight D. Eisenhower, influenced by his experiences as a young Army officer crossing the country in the 1919 Army Convoy on the Lincoln Highway, the first road across America. Eisenhower gained an appreciation of the Reichsautobahn system, the first "national" implementation of modern Germany's Autobahn network, as a necessary component of a national defense system while he was serving as Supreme Commander Of Allied Forces in Europe during World War II, he recognized that the proposed system would provide key ground transport routes for military supplies and troop deployments in case of an emergency or foreign invasion. The publication in 1955 of the General Location of National System of Interstate Highways, informally known as the Yellow Book, mapped out what became the Interstate Highway System. Assisting in the planning was Charles Erwin Wilson, still head of General Motors when President Eisenhower selected him as Secretary of Defense in January 1953.
The Interstate Highway System was authorized on June 29, 1956 by the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, popularly known as the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956. Three states have claimed the title of first Interstate Highway. Missouri claims that the first three contracts under the new program were signed in Missouri on August 2, 1956; the first contract signed was for upgrading a section of US Route 66 to what is now designated Interstate 44. On August 13, 1956, Missouri awarded the first contract based on new Interstate Highway funding. Kansas claims. Preliminary construction had taken place before the act was signed, paving started September 26, 1956; the state marked its portion of I-70 as the first project in the United States completed under the provisions of the new Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. The Pennsylvania Turnpike could be considered one of the first Interstate Highways. On October 1, 1940, 162 miles of the highway now designated I‑70 and I‑76 opened between Irwin and Carlisle.
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania refers to the turnpike as the Granddaddy of the Pikes. Milestones in the construction of the Interstate Highway System include: October 17, 1974: Nebraska becomes
Iquitos
Iquitos known as City of Iquitos, is the capital city of Peru's Maynas Province and Loreto Region. The largest metropolis in the Peruvian Amazon, east of the Andes, it is the ninth most populous city of Peru, it is known as the "capital of the Peruvian Amazon". The city is located in the Great Plains of the Amazon Basin, fed by the Amazon and Itaya rivers. Overall, it constitutes the Iquitos metropolitan area, a conurbation of 471,993 inhabitants consisting of four districts: Iquitos, Belén, San Juan Bautista, it is the largest city in the world that cannot be reached by road – it is accessible only by river and air. The area was long inhabited by indigenous peoples; the founding date of the European city is uncertain. Spanish historical documents state that it was set up around 1757 as a Spanish Jesuit reduction by the banks of the Nanay River; the Jesuits gathered local Napeano and Iquito natives to live here, they named it San Pablo de Napeanos. In the late 19th century, the city became the center of export of rubber production from the Amazon Basin and was the headquarters of the Peruvian Amazon Company.
The rubber boom attracted thousands of European traders and workers, some of whom amassed wealth with the high-volume production and trade in rubber. The city's economy was dependent on the PAC, controlled in the nation by Peruvian businessman Julio César Arana; the operations of PAC's forces in the Basin, who kept indigenous workers in near slavery conditions through use of force and harsh treatment, was investigated by Roger Casement, the British consul-general in Peru. He had investigated labor conditions for natives in the Congo Free State when it was under King Leopold's control, reporting on the abuse of thousands of workers, his 1913 exposure of abuses of Peruvian workers caused a reaction against the company among the several British members of its board and many stockholders. The company struggled financially and lost backing in the UK. In addition, rubber seedlings had been smuggled out of the country and cultivated on plantations in Southeast Asia; as the plants matured, the competition undercut prices of the Peruvian product.
With the decline of the rubber industry, many workers and merchants left Iquitos. As one of the leading cities, along with Manaus, in the huge Amazon rubber boom, Iquitos was influenced by the numerous Europeans who flocked to it. Architecture and cultural institutions established during this period expressed their own traditions. An opera house and Jewish cemetery were among the institutions established. In the 20th century, the city and region diversified its economy; the region exported timber and their products, oil and agricultural crops. It derives considerable revenue from tourism and related crafts, as well as bakery, carbonated drinks and beer. By 1999, the city had consolidated its four municipalities; the architecture and historical treasures reflect the colonial and early 20th-century European period, attracting an increased tourist trade in the 21st century. In addition it is a center of ecological tourism, it has become a major cosmopolitan city with strong roots in the Amazon, featuring a complex history and cuisine, Amazonian landscapes, a growing cultural movement.
In 2012, 250,000 visitors were recorded. Many have been attracted since the Amazon rainforest was ranked as one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. Iquitos inaugurated international flights to the main hub of Panama City in 2012, with shared destinations with Miami and Cancún, its international airport is expected to become one of six international air centers of Peru. The city was ranked as sixth on the list of "10 leading cities in 2011" of the Lonely Planet guidebook; the Historic Center of Iquitos has several structures that have been designated as part of the Cultural Heritage of the Nation: the Cathedral of Iquitos, the Iron House, the Old Hotel Palace, Cohen House, more than 70 other buildings. Other landmarks are the Plaza de Armas; the city is home to the Amazon Library, one of the two most important in Latin America. The city can be reached only by airplane or boat, with the exception of a road to Nauta, a small town 100 km south. Ocean vessels of 3,000 to 9,000 tons and 5.5 metres draft can reach Iquitos via the Amazon River from the Atlantic Ocean, 3,600 kilometres away.
Most people travel within the city via motorcycle, or the ubiquitous auto rickshaw. This is a modified motorcycle with a cabin behind supported by two wheels, seating up to three persons. Transportation to nearby towns requires a river trip via pequepeque, a small public motorized boat; the area was inhabited for thousands of years by Amerindians. At the time of European encounter, the Napeano and Iquito peoples occupied the area, they had small seasonal settlements and were nomadic hunter-gatherers, living in close association with the rivers. The city name of Iquitos is derived from a group of native people called Iquitos by the Spaniards, they had inhabited areas along the rivers Pastaza, Tigre and Curaray. The native Iquitos migrated to the area around the rivers Nanay, Amazonas and the Lake Moronacocha. Between 1638 to 1769, the Iquitos and other native tribes of the Marañon rivers were obliged to settle down in various Missions founded and run by Jesuit missionaries from the Audiencia of Quito.
The Jesuits s
Boca Raton, Florida
Boca Raton is the southernmost city in Palm Beach County, United States, first incorporated on August 2, 1924 as "Bocaratone," and incorporated as "Boca Raton" in 1925. The 2015 population estimated by the U. S. Census Bureau was 93,235; however 200,000 people with a Boca Raton postal address reside outside its municipal boundaries. Such areas include newer developments like West Boca Raton; as a business center, the city experiences significant daytime population increases. It is one of the wealthiest communities in South Florida. Boca Raton is 43 miles north of Miami and is a principal city of the Miami metropolitan area, which had a population of 6,012,331 people as of 2015. Boca Raton is home to the main campus of Florida Atlantic University and the corporate headquarters of Office Depot, ADT, Lynn University, Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Bluegreen Corporation, the Gift of Life Marrow Registry, it is home to the Evert Tennis Academy, owned by former professional tennis player Chris Evert.
Town Center Mall, an upscale shopping center in Central Boca Raton, is the largest indoor mall in Palm Beach County. Another major attraction to the area is Boca Raton's downtown, known as Mizner Park. Many buildings in the area have a Mediterranean Revival or Spanish Colonial Revival architectural theme inspired by Addison Mizner, a resort architect who influenced the city's early development. Still today, Boca Raton has a strict development code for the size and types of commercial buildings, building signs, advertisements that may be erected within the city limits. No outdoor car dealerships are allowed in the municipality. No billboards are permitted; the strict development code has led to several major thoroughfares without large signs or advertisements in the traveler's view. Labeled in the first European maps of the area as "Boca de Ratones", many people mistakenly translate the name in English as "Rats' Mouth". Although incorrect, this translation continues to be popularized by several residents of the area itself.
For example, tailgating for football games at Florida Atlantic University is done in an area known as the "Rat's Mouth"."Boca", meaning mouth in Spanish, was a common term to describe an inlet on maps by sailors. The true meaning of the word "ratones" for the area is more controversial; some claim that the word "ratones" appears in old Spanish maritime dictionaries referring to "rugged rocks or stony ground on the bottom of some ports and coastal outlets, where the cables rub against." Thus, one possible translation of "Boca Raton" is "rugged inlet". Still other people claim that "ratones" referred to thieves who hid out in the area, thus the name could translate to "thieves' inlet". Residents of the city have kept the pronunciation of Boca Raton similar to its Spanish origins. In particular, the "Raton" in "Boca Raton" is pronounced as instead of; the latter is a common mispronunciation by non-natives to the region. The area where Boca Raton is now located was occupied by the Glades culture, a Native American tribe of hunter/gatherers who relocated seasonally and between shellfish sources, distinct from the Tequesta to the south and the Jaega to the north, a people that occupied an area along the southeastern Atlantic coast of Florida.
What Spanish voyagers called "Boca de Ratones" was to the south, in present-day Biscayne Bay in Miami-Dade County. The area of Boca Raton was labeled meaning "Dry River", during this time. By mistake during the 19th century, mapmakers moved this location to the north and began referring to the city's lake, today known as Lake Boca Raton, as "Boca Ratone Lagoon" and "Boca Ratone Sounde." An inland stream near the lake was renamed Spanish River, became part of the Intracoastal Waterway. When Spain surrendered Florida to Britain in 1763, the remaining Tequestas, along with other Indians that had taken refuge in the Florida Keys, were evacuated to Cuba. In the 1770s, Bernard Romans reported seeing abandoned villages in the area, but no inhabitants; the area remained uninhabited for long afterwards, during the early years of Florida's incorporation in the United States. The first significant European settler to this area was Captain Thomas Moore Rickards in 1895, who resided in a house made of driftwood on the east side of the East Coast Canal, south of what is now the Palmetto Park Road bridge.
He surveyed and sold land from the canal to beyond the railroad north of what is now Palmetto Park Road. Early settlement in the area increased shortly after Henry Flagler's expansion of the Florida East Coast Railway, connecting West Palm Beach to Miami. Boca Raton as a city was the creation of architect Addison Mizner. Prior to him, Boca Raton was an unincorporated farming town with a population of 100 in 1920. In 1925, Mizner announced his plan for “the foremost resort city on the North American continent,” “a new exclusive social capital in America.” After spending several years in Palm Beach, where, in his own words, he “did more than any one man to make the city beautiful,” and designed the Everglades Club among many other buildings, in Boca Raton his plan was to create from scratch “a resort as splendid in its entirety as Palm Beach is in spots.”Activity in that area began at least a year, more, before Mizner's announcement. Land acquisition, tens of thousands of acres, was the largest part.
But it is hard not to see Mizner's hand in the incorporation of Boca Raton in 1924. The Mizner Development Company was incorpo
Wales
Wales is a country, part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Bristol Channel to the south, it had a population in 2011 of 3,063,456 and has a total area of 20,779 km2. Wales has over 1,680 miles of coastline and is mountainous, with its higher peaks in the north and central areas, including Snowdon, its highest summit; the country has a changeable, maritime climate. Welsh national identity emerged among the Britons after the Roman withdrawal from Britain in the 5th century, Wales is regarded as one of the modern Celtic nations. Llywelyn ap Gruffudd's death in 1282 marked the completion of Edward I of England's conquest of Wales, though Owain Glyndŵr restored independence to Wales in the early 15th century; the whole of Wales was annexed by England and incorporated within the English legal system under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. Distinctive Welsh politics developed in the 19th century. Welsh liberalism, exemplified in the early 20th century by Lloyd George, was displaced by the growth of socialism and the Labour Party.
Welsh national feeling grew over the century. Established under the Government of Wales Act 1998, the National Assembly for Wales holds responsibility for a range of devolved policy matters. At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, development of the mining and metallurgical industries transformed the country from an agricultural society into an industrial nation. Two-thirds of the population live in South Wales, including Cardiff, Swansea and the nearby valleys. Now that the country's traditional extractive and heavy industries have gone or are in decline, Wales' economy depends on the public sector and service industries and tourism. Although Wales shares its political and social history with the rest of Great Britain, a majority of the population in most areas speaks English as a first language, the country has retained a distinct cultural identity and is bilingual. Over 560,000 Welsh language speakers live in Wales, the language is spoken by a majority of the population in parts of the north and west.
From the late 19th century onwards, Wales acquired its popular image as the "land of song", in part due to the eisteddfod tradition. At many international sporting events, such as the FIFA World Cup, Rugby World Cup and the Commonwealth Games, Wales has its own national teams, though at the Olympic Games, Welsh athletes compete as part of a Great Britain team. Rugby union is seen as an expression of national consciousness; the English words "Wales" and "Welsh" derive from the same Germanic root, itself derived from the name of the Gaulish people known to the Romans as Volcae and which came to refer indiscriminately to all non-Germanic peoples. The Old English-speaking Anglo-Saxons came to use the term Wælisc when referring to the Britons in particular, Wēalas when referring to their lands; the modern names for some Continental European lands and peoples have a similar etymology. In Britain, the words were not restricted to modern Wales or to the Welsh but were used to refer to anything that the Anglo-Saxons associated with the Britons, including other non-Germanic territories in Britain and places in Anglo-Saxon territory associated with Britons, as well as items associated with non-Germanic Europeans, such as the walnut.
The modern Welsh name for themselves is Cymry, Cymru is the Welsh name for Wales. These words are descended from the Brythonic word combrogi, meaning "fellow-countrymen"; the use of the word Cymry as a self-designation derives from the location in the post-Roman Era of the Welsh people in modern Wales as well as in northern England and southern Scotland. It emphasised that the Welsh in modern Wales and in the Hen Ogledd were one people, different from other peoples. In particular, the term was not applied to the Cornish or the Breton peoples, who are of similar heritage and language to the Welsh; the word came into use as a self-description before the 7th century. It is attested in a praise poem to Cadwallon ap Cadfan c. 633. In Welsh literature, the word Cymry was used throughout the Middle Ages to describe the Welsh, though the older, more generic term Brythoniaid continued to be used to describe any of the Britonnic peoples and was the more common literary term until c. 1200. Thereafter Cymry prevailed as a reference to the Welsh.
Until c. 1560 the word was spelt Kymry or Cymry, regardless of whether it referred to the people or their homeland. The Latinised forms of these names, Cambrian and Cambria, survive as lesser-used alternative names for Wales and the Welsh people. Examples include the Cambrian Mountains, the newspaper Cambrian News, the organisations Cambrian Airways, Cambrian Railways, Cambrian Archaeological Association and the Royal Cambrian Academy of Art. Outside Wales, a related form survives as the name Cumbria in North West England, once a part of Yr Hen Ogledd; the Cumbric language, thought to
Visitor center
A visitor center or centre, visitor information center, tourist information center, is a physical location that provides tourist information to visitors. A visitor center may be: A visitor center at a specific attraction or place of interest, such as a landmark, national park, national forest, or state park, providing information and in-depth educational exhibits and artifact displays. A film or other media display is used. If the site has permit requirements or guided tours, the visitor center is the place where these are coordinated. A tourist information center, providing visitors to a location with information on the area's attractions, lodgings and other items relevant to tourism; these centers are operated at the airport or other port of entry, by the local government or chamber of commerce. A visitor center is called an information center. A corporate visitor center, provides visitors with an accessible window into the corporation. Visitor centers used to provide basic information about the place, corporation or event they are celebrating, acting more as the entry way to a place.
The role of the visitor center has been evolving over the past 10 years to become more of an experience and to tell the story of the place or brand it represents. Many have become experiences in their own right. In the United Kingdom, there is a nationwide network of Tourist Information Centres run by the British Tourist Authority, represented online by the VisitBritain website and public relations organisation. Other TICs are run by local authorities or through private organisations such as local shops in association with BTA. In England, VisitEngland promotes domestic tourism. In Wales, the Welsh Government supports TICs through Visit Wales. In Scotland, the Scottish Government supports VisitScotland, the official tourist organisation of Scotland, which operates Tourist Information Centres across Scotland. In Poland there are special tables giving free information about tourist attractions. Offices are situated in interesting places in popular tourists' destinations and tables stay near monuments and important culture In North America, a welcome center is a rest area with a visitor center, located after the entrance from one state or province to another state or province or in some cases another country along an Interstate Highway or other freeway.
These information centers are operated by the state. The first example opened on 4 May 1935, next to US 12 in New Buffalo, near the Indiana state line. Many United States cities, such as Houston and Boca Raton, Florida, as well as counties and other areas smaller than states operate welcome centers, though with less facilities than state centers have. In Ontario, there are 11 Ontario Travel Information Centres located along 400-series highways. Peru features Iperú, Tourist Information and Assistance, a free service that provides tourist information for domestic and foreign travelers, the information covers destinations, recommended routes and licensed tourism companies in Peru, it provides assistance on various procedures or where tourists have problems of various kinds. Iperú receives suggestions for destinations and tourism companies operating in Peru. Iperú, Tourist Information and Assistance has a nationwide network represented online by the Peru.travel website, the 24/7 line 5748000, 31 local offices in 13 regions in all over Peru: Lima-Callao, Piura, Lambayeque, La Libertad, Arequipa, Puno, Cusco and Iquitos.
The official tourist organization or national tourist board of Peru is PromPerú, a national organization that promotes both tourism and international commerce of this country worldwide. In Australia, most visitor centres are local or state government-run, or in some cases as an association of tourism operators on behalf of the government managed by a board or executive; those that comply with a national accreditation programme use the italic "i" as pictured above. These visitor information centres provide information on the local area, perform services such as accommodation and tour bookings, flight/bus/train/hire car options, act as the first point of contact a visitor has with the town or region. Heritage center Heritage interpretation Interpretation center Nature center United States Capitol Visitor Center Communicating with visitors – 16 tips for visitor centers
Welsh Government
The Welsh Government is the devolved government of Wales. It was established by the Government of Wales Act 1998, which created a devolved administration for Wales in line with the result of the 1997 referendum on devolution; the Welsh Government formally separated from the Assembly in 2007 following the passage of the Government of Wales Act 2006. The government consists of ministers, who attend cabinet meetings, deputy ministers who do not, of a counsel general, it is led by the first minister the leader of the largest party in the National Assembly, who selects ministers and deputy ministers with the approval of the assembly. The government is responsible for tabling policy in devolved areas for consideration by the assembly and implementing policy, approved by it; the current Welsh Government is a Labour led administration, following the 2016 National Assembly for Wales election. Mark Drakeford has been the First Minister of Wales since December 2018; as established, the Welsh Government had no independent executive powers in law.
The National Assembly was established as a body corporate by the Government of Wales Act 1998 and the executive, as a committee of the assembly, only had those powers that the assembly as a whole voted to delegate to ministers. The Government of Wales Act 2006 formally separated the National Assembly for Wales and the Welsh Government, giving Welsh ministers independent executive authority, this taking effect after the May 2007 elections. Following separation, the Welsh ministers exercise functions in their own right. Further transfers of executive functions from the British government can be made directly to the Welsh ministers by an Order in Council approved by the British parliament. Separation was designed to clarify the respective roles of the government. Under the structures established by the Government of Wales Act 2006, the role of Welsh ministers is to make decisions; the 60 assembly members in the National Assembly scrutinise policies. The result mirrored much more the relationship between the British government and British parliament and that between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament.
The new arrangements provided for in the Government of Wales Act 2006 created a formal legal separation between the National Assembly for Wales, comprising 60 assembly members, the Welsh Assembly Government, comprising the First Minister, Welsh ministers, deputy ministers and the counsel general. This separation between the two bodies took effect on the appointment of the First Minister by Queen Elizabeth II following the assembly election on 3 May 2007. Separation was meant to clarify the respective roles of the government; the role of the government is to make decisions. The 60 assembly members in the National Assembly scrutinise the Welsh Government's decisions and policies. Assembly measures can now go further than the subordinate legislation which the assembly had the power to make prior to 2007; the assembly's functions, including that of making subordinate legislation, in the main, transferred to the Welsh ministers upon separation. A third body was established under the 2006 Act from May 2007, called the National Assembly for Wales Commission.
It employs the staff supporting the new National Assembly for Wales, holds property, enters into contracts and provides support services on its behalf. The 2006 Act made new provision for the appointment of Welsh ministers; the First Minister is nominated by the Assembly and appointed by Her Majesty the Queen. The First Minister appoints the Welsh Ministers and the Deputy Welsh Ministers, with the approval of Her Majesty; the Act created a new post of Counsel General for Wales, the principal source of legal advice to the Welsh Government. The Counsel General is appointed by the Queen, on the nomination of the First Minister, whose recommendation must be agreed by the National Assembly; the Counsel General may be, but does not have to be, an Assembly Member. The Act permits a maximum of 12 Welsh Ministers, which includes Deputy Welsh Ministers, but excludes the First Minister and the Counsel General. Accordingly, the maximum size of the Welsh Government is 14. Following the "yes" vote in the referendum on further law-making powers for the assembly on 3 March 2011, the Welsh Government is now entitled to propose bills to the National Assembly for Wales on subjects within 20 fields of policy.
Subject to limitations prescribed by the Government of Wales Act 2006, Acts of the National Assembly may make any provision that could be made by Act of Parliament. The 20 areas of responsibility devolved to the National Assembly for Wales are: Agriculture, fisheries and rural development Ancient monuments and historical buildings Culture Economic development Education and training Environment Fire and rescue services and promotion of fire safety Food Health and health services Highways and transport Housing Local government National Assembly for Wales Public administration Social welfare Sport and rec
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