Tài liệu Part 8- Britain ppt

expressions of public sympathy for the Queen. But
when
the
government
announc
ed that public m
one
y was going to pay for the
repairs, the sympathy quickly t
urned
to anger. The
Queen
had
recently been reported
to
be the richest
wo
man in the
wo
rld, so
people didn 't see
why
she
sho
uldn't pay for them herself,
It is, in fact, on the subject of Inoney th
at'
anti-royalist'
opinio
ns
are

mo
st often expressed. In the early nineties even s
ome
Conservat -
ive MPs, traditionally strong supporters of the
monar
chy, started
protesting at h
ow
much
the royal family was cost ing the country.
For the whole of her l
ong
reign Elizabeth II
had
been
exempt from
taxation.
BUl,
as a resp
on
se LOthe change in attitude, the
Queen
decided that she
would
start paying taxes
on
her private
income.
In

addition, Civil List paym ents to
some
membe
rs
of
the royal family
were stopped. (The Civil List is
the
mo
ney
wh
ich the
Queen
and
some
of
her relatives get from Parliament each year so that they can
carry
out
their public du ues.)
For
mo
st
peop
le, the
mo
st notable event marking
Queen
Elizabeth's
40th

anniversary was a televi si
on
programme
abou
t a year
in her life
whi
ch
showed
revealing details
of
her
private family
lif
e.
In the foll
owi
ng year parts of Buckingham Palace
were,
for the first
time,
open
ed for public visits (to raise
mone
y to help pay for the
repairs to Winds
or
Castle) . These events are perhaps an indication
of
the future roya l style - a little less grand, a little less distant.

QUESTIO
N S
The future
of
the monarchy 81
One's bum year
The
Sun
is Britain's most popular
daily n
ew
spaper (see chapter
(8).
This was its from page headline after
the Queen had spoken of
1992
as an
onnus
horribilis
(Latin for 'a horrible
year'). As \

ell as the separation
of
Charles and Diana, 199 2 had
included the fire at Windsor Castle
and the
news
that Australia was
intendi ng

to
break its ties with the
'old country' and
become
a republic.
The headline uses the similarity
bet
ween
'an
nes'
and 'anus'
to
make
a pun
of'b
um ' (which, in colloquial
British English, can mean both
'anus ' and 'horrible'). It also mimics
the supposed frequent use
by the
Queen
of
the pronoun
'one'
to mean
'ri
me'.
The headline thus mixes the

ery formal-soundi

ng'
one'
with the
ery
colloquial 'bum '. Itis imposs-
ible
to
imagine
that
such a
disrespectful (and
unsympathetic)
headline cou ld have appeared in the
J
91)0S
or
19605.
I Why d
oe
s the British Prime Minister
continue
La 'advise' and 'request' the
Queen,
wh
en
everybody kn
ow
s that he
or
she is really t

elling
her
what
to do?
2 The attitude
of
the
British
peop
le
toward
s their
royal family has changed over the last quarter
of the twentieth century. In what
way
has
it
cha
nged
, and
wha
t d
em
onstrates that there has
been a c
hange'
Why
do
you
think this has

ha
ppened
'
S
UGGESTI
O N S
3 Would
you
advise the British to get rid
of
their
monarchy?
4 Do you have a monarch in
you
r
coun
try, or
someone
wh
o fulfils a similar
role'
If you do,
how
doe
s their
po
sition c
ompar
e
wi

th that
of
the British m
ona
rch'
If you d
on't,
do you think
your
co
untry
wo
uld benefit frorn having a
figurehead w ho
cou
ld perform the func tions of
a mon arch?
•
The
Queen
and
I by Sue T
own
send (Mandarin) includes
humorou
s
characterizations
of
the main
mem

bers
of
the royal family.
• Books about the
mo
narchy
abo
und. A
mo
ng them are:
Th
ePrin
ce
of
Wa
les:
A
Bio
graph
y by J
onath
an
Dimbleb
y (Little, Brown and
Company) , TheQu
een
by Kenneth Harris (
Orion
) ,
El

i
zab
eth
R:
The
R
ole
of
the
M
on
archy
To
day
by Antony Jay (BBCBooks),
Di
ana, Her
Tru
e
Sto
ry and
D
iana
, Her
New
Life
,
both
by An
drew

Morton
(Michael
O'Ma
ra Books
Limited) .
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82
Ministers and
depa
r
tments
Most heads
of
government depart-
ments
have the title 'Secretary of
State' (as in, for example , 'Secretary
of
State for the Environment'). The
minister in charge of Britain 's rela-
tions wi th the outs ide 'world is
know
n to everybody as the 'Foreign
Secretary' . The
one
in charge
of
law
and order inside the country is the
'Home Secretary'. Their depart-

ments are called the Foreign and
Common
wealth
Office and the
Home Office respectively (the
words'
exterior' and 'interior' are
not used) . The
wor
ds 'secretary' and
'office' reflect the history
of
govern-
ment
in Britain. in
whi
ch
gove
rnme nt departments
were
at
one
time
pan
of
the
dom
estic
arra
ngements

of
the monarch.
Another imp ortant person is the
'Chancellor
of
the Exchequer',
who
is the head
of
the Treasury (in other
words. a s
on
of Minister
of
Finance) .
8
The government
Who
governs Britain?
When
the media talk about 'the governme nt'
they usually mean one
of
two
things. The term 'the goverm
ne
nt' can
be used to refer to all
of
the politicians who have been app ointed by

the
mona
rch (on the advice
of
the Prime Minister) to help run govern-
m
ent
departments (there are several politicians in each department)
or to take on various other special responsibilities, such as managing
the activities
of
Parliament. There are normally about a hund red
members
of 'the government' in this sense. Although there are
various ranks, each wi th their
own
titles (
c-
Mi
nist
er
s
and
depa
rt
m
en
ts
) .
members of the govern ment are usually kno

wn
as
'm
irusters'. All
ministers com e fr
om
the ranks of Parliament , most of
them
from the
House of Commons. Unlike in the USA and in some other countries
in Europe, it is rare for a person from outside Parliament to be
com
e
a minister. (And
wh
en this does happ en , the person concerned is
quickly found a seat in one
of
the t
wo
Houses.)
The other meaning of the term 'the governn1ent' is more limited.
It refers only to the
mo
st p
ow
erfu l of these politicians, namely the
Prime Minister and the other members
of
the cabinet. There are

usually a
bout
twenty
peo
ple in the cabinet (though there are no
rules about this). Most of t
hem
are the heads of the gov
ernm
ent
departments.
Partly a
sa
result of the electoral system (see chapter 10) , Britain,
unlike
mu
ch
of
western Europe,
norma
lly has 'single-party govern -
ment '. In other
word
s, all m
emb
ers of the governme nt belong to the
same politi cal party. Traditionally, British politicians have regarded
coalition gove
rnment
(wit

h several parties involved) as a bad idea.
Since the formation of modern poli tical parties in the nineteenth
ce
ntury
, Britain has had a total of only
twen
ty-on e years of coalition
gove
rnments
( t915- 1922 and 1931
-194
5) . Even
whe
n, for brief
periods in the 1970s, no Single party had a majority of seats in the
House
of
C
omm
ons, no coalition was formed. There was a
'
min
ority government' instead.
The habit of Single-party government has helped to establish the
tradition known as collective responsibility. That is, every
membe
r
of the gove
rnme
nt, however junior, shares the resp

on
sibility for
every policy made by the government. This is true even if, as is often
the case, he or she did not play any part in making it. o f course,
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individua l government
members
may
ho
ld
diff
erent
opinions,
but
they are expected
to
keep these private. Byconvention, no
member
of
the govermn ent can criticize
government
policy in pu blic. Any
m
ember
wh
o
doe
s so must resign.
The ca
binet

Obviou sly,
no
gov
enun
ent
want
s an im
por
tant m
ember
of
its party
to start criticizing it. This
wou
ld lead
to
divis
ion
s in the party.
Ther
e-
fore, the leading politicians in the governing party usually be
com
e
members
of
the cabinet,
whe
re they are tied to gover
nmen

t policy
by the
conven
tion of collec tive res
po
nsibility.
The cabinet meets once a week
and
takes decision s
about
n
ew
policies, the impl
emen
tation
of
existing
po
licies a
nd
the
runn
ing
of
the various
government
departments. Because all gove
rnmen
t
mem

bers must be seen to agree, exactly
who
says
what
at these
meetings is a closely guarded secret. Reports are made
of
the
mee
tings
and circulated
to
gove
rnment
department
s. They summarize the
topics discussed
and
the decisions taken ,
but
they never refer
to
individuals
or
what
t
hey
said.
To help
run

the complicated ma
chiner
y
of
a
modern
gove
rnment,
there is an organization called the cabinet
of
fice. It
run
s a busy
com munication
netw
ork, keeping ministers in
touch
with each
other
and drawing up the agendas for cabine t
meeti
ngs. It also does the
same things for the
many
cabinet
com
mittees. These
comm
ittees are
a

ppointed
by the cabinet to look
into
various matters in
more
detail
than the ind iv
idua
l
member
s
of
the cabinet have the time (or
knowl
edge) for. Unlike
members
of
'the
governme
nt' itself. the
p
eop
le on these
committee
s are
not
necessarily politicians.
The Pri
me
Min

ister
The position
of
a British Prime Minister (PM) is in direct contrast to
that of the
monar
ch. Although the
Queen
appears to have a great
deal
of
pow
er, in reality she has very little. The PM,
on
the
other
hand, appears no t to have
much
power
but in reali ty has a very great
The cabinet 83
A cabinet me
eting
in
progre
ss

The cabin
et
The history

of
the cabinet is a good
example
of
the tendency to secrecy
in British poli tics.
It started in the
eighteenth century as an informal
g
rouping
of important ministers and
of
ficials
of
the royal household. It
had no formal recognition. Officially
speaking, the government was
run
by the Privy Council, a body
of
a
hundred
or
more
people (including
those belonging to
'the
cabinet'),
directly responsible to the
monarch

(but not to each
other).
Over the
years, the cabinet gradually took
over effective
power
.
.Ihe
Privy
C2 11~cil
is
now
a merely ceremonial
organization
with
no power. Among
others,it includes all the present
ministers
and
the most important
past ministers.
In the last hu ndred years, the
cabinet has itselfbecome mo re
and
more
'of
ficial' and
pub
licly recog -
nized.

It has also
grown
in size, and
so is
now
often too rigid and formal
a
body
to take the real decisions. In
the last fifty years, there have been
unofficial
'inner
cabinets'
(comprising the Prime Minister and
a few other important ministers). It
is
thought
that
it
is here, and in
cabinet committees, that
much
of
the real decisio
n-making
takes place.
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84 8 The government
~
No. 10

Down
ing
Street
Here is an example of the traditional
fiction that Prime Ministers are not
especially
imp
ortant people. Their
official residence doe s not have a
special name. Nor, from the outside.
does it look special.
It is
not
even a
detached house! Inside, though. it is
muc h larger than it looks. The
cabinet meets here and the cabinet
office works here. The PM lives
'above the shop' on the top floor.
The Chancellor
of
the Exchequer
lives next d
oor
, at No. I
I,
and the
Government
Chief
Whi p (see

chapter
10)
at No.
12
, so that the
wh ole street is a lot
more
important
than it appears. Still. there is some-
thing very
dom
estic about this
arrangement. After the government
loses an election all three ministers
have
to
throw
out
their rubbish and
wait
for the furniture vans to turn
up, just like anybody else moving
house.
The PM also has an official
country residence
to
the west of
London, called
'Chequers.
The i

dea
l
Pr
im e
Ministe
r
Here is another extract (see chap ter
6) fr
om
Y
es
, Prime
Mini
ster.the polit-
ical satire.
It is a section
of
the private
diar y of a senior civil servant. In it
he describes his conversation
with
anoth
er top civil servant, in which
they discussed
who
should become
the new Prime Minister. When he
says 'experts' in the last line he
means. of course. the civil servants
them

selves!
deal indeed. Aswe have seen (chapter 7), the Queen is, in practice,
obliged to give the job
of
Prime Minister to the person who can
c
ommand
a majority in the H
ou
se of
Comm
on
s. This normally means
the leader of the party
with
the largest n
umb
er
ofM
Ps.
Fr
om
one point of v
iew
, the PM is no m
or
e than the fore
most
of
Her Majesty's political servants. The traditional phrase describes him

or her as
primu
s i
nter
po
r" (Latin for 'first a
mong
equals
').
But in fact
the
othe
r
min
isters are not nearly as
powe
rful. The re are several
reasons for this. First, the monar
ch'
s powers
of
patronage (the power
to appoint people
to
allkindsof jobsand
to
confer honours on people)
are, by convention ,actuallythe PM's powers
of
patronage. The fiction

is that the Queen appoints people to government jobs
'on
the advice
of
the Prime Minister'. But
wh
at actually happens is that the PM
simp ly decides. Everybody knows this. The media do not even make
the pretence that the PM has successfully persuaded the Queen to
make a particular appointment, they simply state that he or she has
mad
e an appoi
ntme
nt.
The strength
of
the PM's po
wer
of patronage is apparent from the
modern phenom enon
know
n as the 'cabinet reshuffle'. For the past
thirty years it has been the habit of the PM to change his or her cabinet
quite frequently (at least once every t
wo
years). Afew cabinet
m
emb
ers are
drop

ped , and a few n
ew
members are brought in, but
mostly the existing m
emb
ers are shuffled around, like a pack of
cards, each gelling a new department
to
look after.
The second reason for a m
odern
PM's do
min
ance over other minis-
ters is the
pow
er of the PM's publi c image. The mass media has
tended to make politics a matter
of
personali ties. The details
of
pol-
icies are hard to
und
erstand. An
ind
ividual, constantly appearing on
the television and in the newspapers, is much easier to identify with.
Everybody in the country can recognize the Prime Minister, while
many can

not
put a name to the faces
of
the
other
ministers. Asa result
the PM can,if theneed arises, go 'over the heads'
of
the other ministers
and appeal directly
to
the public.
We take a fairly dim view of
them
both
[the
two
candidates]. It is a
difficult choice, rather like asking
wh
ich lunatic should
run
the asylum.
We both agreed that they
would
present the same problems. They are
both interventionists
and
they
would

both have foolish notions
about
running
the country themselves
if
they became Prime Minister.

It is
clearly advisable
to
look for a
comp
romise candidate.
We agreed that such a candidate
must
have the following qualities:
he must be malleable, flexible
,li
keable, have no firm opinions, no bright
ideas, not be intellectually committed, and be
withou
t the strength
of
p
urp
ose to change anyt hing. Above all, he
mus
t be
someone
who

m we
know
can be professionally guided, and who is willing
to
leave the
business
of
government in the
hand
s
of
experts.
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Third, all ministers except the PM are kept bus y looking after their
gov
ernm
ent
dep
artment
s. They
don't
have t
ime
to
think a
bout
and
discuss
governm
ent

policy as a
whole
, But the PM does, and cabinet
co
mm
ittees usually rep
on
directly
to
him
or her,
not
to the cabinet
as a
who
le.
Mor
eover, the cabinet office is directly
unde
r the PM 's
control and w
or
ks in the same
building
. As a result, the PM
know
s
mor
e ab
out

what is go ing on than the
other
minister
s do . Because
there is
not
eno ugh tim e for the cabinet to discuss
most
matters, a
cho
ice has
to
be
mad
e about what will be discussed. And it is the PM
who ma kes that
choi
ce.
Mane
rs that are
not
discussed can, in effect,
be decided by the PM . The
convention
of
collective
respon
sibility
then
mean

s that the rest of the gov
ernment
have to go along
with
whatever the PM has decided.
The civil service
Considering h
ow
complex
moder
n states are, t
here
are no t really very
man y people in a British 'govern ment' (as defined above) . Unli ke
some other c
oun
tries
(th
e USA for
examp
le), no t even the
mo
st
senior
admini
strative jobs change h
and
s
when
a new

government
comes to po\ver. The day
-to
-day
running
of the gove
rnm
ent
and
the
imple
ment
ation of its policy contiriue in the hands
of
the sam e
people that
we
re there
with
the
previous
governm
ent - the
top
rank
of
the civil service.
Governm
ents come and go,
but

the civil service
remains. It is no accid
ent
that the
most
sen
ior
civil servant in a govern -
me nt
departm
ent
has the title
of
'Pe
rman
ent
Secretary'.
Unlike politicians, civil servants , even
of
the hig hest ran k, are
unkn
own
to the larg er pu blic. There are
proba
bly less
than
10,000
people in the
country
who,

if you asked t
hem,
could
give
you
the
nam
es of the present secretary to the cabinet
(w
ho runs the cabinet
office) or the
pre
sent head
of
the
home
civil service; still fewer
know
the name s
of
more
than one
of
the present
perma
nent
secretaries.
For those who bel
on
g to it, the British civil service is a career. Its

most senior positi
on
s are usually filled by
peo
ple who have been
working
in it for
twent
y years or more. These
peop
le get a high salary
(higher than that of their ministers) , have absolute
job
security
(unlike their
minister
s)
and
stand a
good
chance
of
being
awarded
an official
honour.
By c
om
parison, ministers, even those who have
been in the same

department
for several years, are still new to the
job. Moreover, civil servants k
now
the secrets
of
the
previo
us gov-
er
nm
en t
which
the present
minister
is un a
wa
re of.
For all the se reasons, it is
often
possible for top civil servants to
exercise quite a lot
of
c
on
trol over their mini sters,
and
it is
sometime
s

said that it is they, and no t their
mini
sters,
wh
o really govern the
country. There is
undoubtedly
some tr
uth
in this
opin
ion
. Ind eed,
an interesting case in early
1994
suggests that civil servants now
expe
ct
to have a d
egre
e
of
control. At this time, the association w
hich
represents the country's lOp civil servants
made
an official
comp
laint
The civil service

85"

Prime
Ministers sinc e 1940
Winston Churchill (19+0-4-1))
Clement Aulec (194-5-1) I)
Winston Churchill ([ 9I)
[-I)
'))
Anthony Eden
(19H-,)7)
Harold Macmillan ( 19
')7-6
3)
Alec Douglas-Home (1963-64-)
Harold Wilson (1964 70)
Edward Heath ([
97°-74-)
Harold Wilson (1974-
-76)
lames Callaghan
(1976-79)
Margaret Thatcher (J
979-9
r )
John Major
(J991-97)
Tony Blair ( 1997
-)
BJUf

::::
Ccnservetive
Red
::::
Lcbour

The
o rigins
ofth
e civil service
The British'cult of the talented
amateur' (see chapter I)) is not
normally expressed openly. But
when,
in the
midd
le
of
the nine -
teenth century, the structure of
the
modern
civil service was
established, it was a consciously
stated principle, as described by the
contemporary historian Lord
Macauley:
We believe that men who have
been engaged. up to t
wenty

-one
or twe nty-two. in studies which
have no immediate connection
with the business of any profes-
sion, and of which the effect is
m~
rely
to open, to invigorate, and
to enrich the
mind,
will generally
be found in the business
of
every
pro fession superior to men
who
have, at eighteen or nineteen.
devoted themselves to the special
studies of their calling.
In
other
words, it is better
to
be a
non -specialist than a specialis t, to
have a good brain rather than
thor
-
ough
knowledge. Reforms since

then have given greater emphasis
Lo
specialist knowledge, but the central
beliefremains that administration
is
an
an
rather than an applied science.
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86 8 The government
~
W
h
i
t
e
h
a
ll
This is the name
of
the street in
London
which
runs from Trafalgar
Square
to
the Houses
of
Parharnent.

The Foreign and Com
mon
wealth
Office and the Ministry of Defence
are
both
located here. These are the
two
oldest government depart-
ments. The term 'Whitehall' is
sometimes used
to
refer to the gov-
ernment
as a
who
le (although other
departments are in
other
streets
nearby). This is don e
when
the
writer or speaker wishes
to
e
mp
has-
ize the administrative aspects
of

government. The phrase , 'the
opinion
in Whitehall .'
ref
ers not
only
to
the
opin
ions of
governme
nt
ministers but also, and perhaps
more
so, to the
opinions
of senior
civil servants.
o
,
100
,
that four
government
ministers 'verbally abu sed' their civil service
advisers and generally treated them
'with
c
ont
empt

'. It was the first
time that such a complaint
had
been
made
, It seemed that the unpre-
cedentedly long
per
iod
of
government
by the same party (the
Conservatives - see c
hap
ter
10)
had shifted the traditional balance
of
pow
er.
H
ow
ever, the British civil service has a (largely) deserved reputa-
tion for absolute political impartiality. Many ministers have remarked
on the struggle for
power
between them and th
eir
top civil servants,
but very few have ever complained of any political bias. Top civil

servants k
now
that their po\ver depends
on
their staying out o
fpol
u-
ics' and on their being absolutely loyal to their present
mini
ster.
Modern
criticism
of
the civil service
doe
s
not
question its loyalty
but its efficiency. Despite reforms, the t
op
rank
of
the civil service is
still largely
made
up
of
people from the sa
me
narr

ow
section of
society -
peop
le
who
have b
een
to public scliool (see chapter
14)
and then on to Oxford or
Cambr
idge ,
wh
ere they studied subjects
such as history or classical languages. The criticism is ther
ef
ore that
the civil service does
not
have e
nough
expertise in matters such as
economic
s or techn ology. and that it lives too
mu
ch in its own closed
world , cut
off
from the concerns

of
most
peopl e in societ
y.
In the late
twentieth century, ministers tried
to
overcome these percei ved defi-
ciencies by appo inting experts from ou tside the civil service
to
work
on
various projects and by having their
own
political advisersworking
alongside (or,
SOIl1e
wou
ld say, in competition
with)
the ir civil
servants.
Central and local govern
ment
So
me
co
unt
ries, such as the USA
and

Canada, are federal. They are
nu de up of a n
um
ber
of
states , each
of
which
has its own g
overnment
wit h its
own
powers
to make laws and collect taxes. In these countries
the central gover
nments
have
power
s only because the states have
given them
powe
rs. In Britain it is the
oth
er wa y aro
und
. Local gov-
ern
men
t authorities (generally known as 'c
oun

cils') only have
powers because the central
governm
en t has given them pov.·ers.
Indeed, they only exist because the central gover
nmen
t allows them
to
exist. Several times in the last hundred years British gove
rnment
s
have reorganized local gover
nment,
abolishing some local councils
a
nd
bringing n
ew
ones
into
existence.
The system
oflocal
government is very similar to the system of
national gover
nment.
There are elected representatives, called coun-
cillors (the equivalent
ofMP
s). They

meet
in a
cou
ncil chamber in
the Town Hall or County Hall (the equ ivalent of Parliament) , where
they make policy
whic
li is
impleme
nted by local government
of
ficers
(the equivalent
of
civil servants) .
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Most British pe
opl
e have far
mor
e
dir
ect dealings
with
local gov-
ern
ment
than they do w ith national gov
ernm
ent. Local

coun
cils
traditionally manage nearly all
pub
lic services. Taken together, they
employ three tim es as
man
y
peo
ple as the national gove
rnmen
t does.
In addition, there is no system in Britain
wher
eby
a national gove rn -
ment official has responsibility for a particular geog ra
ph
ical area.
(There is
no
one
like a 'prefect' or 'g
overnor)
In practice, therefore,
local councils have traditi
ona
lly been fairly free from cons tant central
interference in their day to day
wo

rk.
Local councils are allowed
to
collect one kind of tax. This is a tax
based on
pro
perty. (All
othe
r k
ind
s are collected by central
govern
me
nt.) It used to be called 'rates' and was paid only by those
who
owned
property. Its
amo
unt varied according
to
the size
and
location of the p
rop
erty. In the early I
99
0S
it was replaced by the
'com
mu

nity cha
rge'
(know
n as the
'p
oll tax') . This charge was the
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II
Central and local government 87
II-
Counti
es,
b
or
ou
ghs
, p
ar
ish
es
Count ies are the oldest divisions
of
the cou
ntr
y in England and Wales.
Most
of
them existed before the
Norman conquest (see chapter 2).
They are still used today for local

govern
ment
purpo
ses, although a
few have been 'invented' more
recently (e.g. Hum berside) and
others have no function in govern-
ment but are still used for
other
pur
poses. One of these is Middlesex,
wh ich covers the western
pan
of
Greater
lond
on (letters are still
addressed 'Middx.'] and which is
the name
of
a top-class cricket team.
Many c
ount
ies have 'shire' in their
name (e.g. H
ertf
ord
shire.
Hampshire, Leicestershire). 'Shires'
is what the counties

were
originally
called.
Bo
roug
hs were originally towns
that had gr
own
large and important
e
nough
to
be given their own gov-
ernme
nt, free
of
control by the
county. These days, the name is used
for local government purposes only
in
lo
ndo n, but many towns still
pro
udly describe themselves as
Royal Bo
rough
s.
Parishes were originally villages
centred on a local church. They
became a unit

of
local government
in the nineteenth century. Today
they are the smallest unit of local
government in England.
The
name
'parish' is still used in
the organization of the main Chris-
tian churches in England (see
chapter 13).
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88 8 The government

The
Greater
London Council
The stor}'of the Greater London
Council (GLC) is an example
of
the
struggle for power betwe en central
and local government, In the early
1980s Britain had a right
-w
ing Con-
servative
gove
rnment, At a time
when this government was unpopu-

lar. the left-Wing Labour party in
London won the local election and
gained con trol
of
the GLC The
Labour-controlled GLC then intro-
duced many measures which the
national government did not like
(for example. it reduced fares o n
London's buses and increased local
taxes to pay for this).
The gove rnment decided to
abolish the GLC Using its majority
in the House
of Com
mo
ns. it was
able to do
this. The p
owe
rs
of
the
GLCwere either given to the
thir ty-
two horoug hs
of
Lon do n, or to
special
commnces. It was not until

the year 20
00
that aSingle govern-
mental authority for the
who
le
of
London came into existence again
and the city
got its first ever directly-
elected mayor.

Public libraries
In co mparison w ith the people of
other western countries. the British
public buy relatively few books .
However. this does not necessarily
mean [hat they read less. There are
about
5"
,
000
public libraries in
Britain (that'sabout one for every
12,000 peopl e). On average. each
one houses around
+5"
.000
books. A
recent survey showed that 70%of

children betwe en the ages
of
four
and sixteen use their local
library at
least twice a month. and that
5"
I %of
them use it once a we ek or more.
In addition . and unfortunately,
many British people seem
to
pr
ef
er
libraries to bookshops even wh en
they want to
ow n a
boo
k. Nearly
nine million
boo
ks are stolen from
the shelves
of libraries every year.
same for everybody
who
lived in the area covered by a council. It was
very un popular and was quickly replaced by the
'cou

ncil tax', which
is based on the estimated value
of
a property and the
numb
er of
people living in it. Local c
ounc
ils are unable to raise enough money
in this way for them
to
provide the services which centralgovernment
has told them to provide. In addition, recent gov
ernment
s have
imposed upper limits on the amount of council tax that councils can
charge and now collect the taxes on business properties themselves
(and then share the m
one
y out between local councils). Asa result,
well over half
of
a local council's income is now given to it by
central government.
The modern trend has been towards greater and greatercomrol by
central
gov
ern
menlo This is not just a matter of controlling the way
local government raises

mone
y. There are n
ow
more laws governing
the way councils can conduct their affairs. On top of this, schools
and hospitals can
now
'opt out ' oflocal-government control (see
chapters
14 and 18). Perhaps this trend is inevitable n
ow
that
national party politics domin ates local politics. Successful independ -
ent candidates (candidates
who
do not belong to a political party) at
local elections are becoming rarer and
rarer.
Most people now vote
at local elections according to their national party preferences, if they
both er
to vote at all, so that these elections become a kind
of
opinion
poll on the performance of the national government.
Local gov
ernm
ent services
Most
of

the numero us services that a modern government provides
are run at local level in Britain.These include
pub
lic hygiene and
environmental health inspection , the collecting
of
rubbish from
outside people's houses (the people
who
do this are euphemistically
known
as 'd ustrnen'), and the cleaning and tidying ofall public places
(which is done by 'street
sweepers)
(
e-
Theorgan
iza
tionoflo
col
gOl"emment)
. They also include the provision
of
public swimming
pools, which charge admission fees, and public parks, which do not.
The latter are mostly just green grassy spaces, but they often contain
children's playgrounds and playing fields for sports such as football
and cricket which can be reserved in advance on payment.
Public librari es are an
other

well-known service (
e-
Publi
c
librari
es
).
Anybod y can go into one
of
these to consult the books, newspapers
and magazines there free
of
charge. If you want to borrow books and
take them out
of
the library, you have to have a library card or ticket
(these are available to people living in the area). Sometimes CDs and
video cassettes are also available for hire . The popularity oflibraries
in
Bri
tain is indicated by the fact that. in a country wi thout identity
cards (see chapter 6), a person's library card is the most common
means of identification forsomeone wh o does not have a driving
licence.
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