How effectively does democracy work in the uk

Question 1

Free & fair elections

Answer 1

Wide variety of elections, citizens can choose representatives for a range of local and national Bodies elections this educates and participate in democratic process

Elections are free from the government manipulation, conducted by the Electoral Commission.
Rules: campaign spending limits, no campaigns in a period of purdah, restricts uk broadcast campaigning and given selected times.

Question 2

Purdah

Answer 2

Period before the election or vote here member of local councils or government are not allowed to make any new statements or proposals that could affect the at in which people vote, usually between 4 to 6 weeks.

Question 3

Turnout

Answer 3

Historic low of 59% in 2001 turnout has been steadily increasing from 65% in 2010 to 69% in 2017. People are starting to participate in the political process

Question 4

Universal suffrage

Answer 4

everyone over The age of 18 who is not a prisoner, mentally incapable or a peer (member of the House of Lords) has the right to vote, one person one vote, no discrimination

Question 5

The party system

Answer 5

Variety of political party and has more than 50, 8 in the House of Commons at 2017 and 11 have held seats before, good completions

Question 6

Pressure group

Answer 6

Uk has thousands of pressure groups, they provide a alternate avenue of representation especially on minority issues
Raise awareness, investigate issues and educates the electorates

Question 7

Devolution

Answer 7

Allowed the constituent parts of the UK along with many cities to make decisions on a local basis.

Question 8

Unelected elements

Answer 8

Monarchy and House of Lords are unelected in a democracy

Question 9

Turnout

Answer 9

low average below 75% participation crisis

Question 10

the west Lothain Question and EVEL

Answer 10

devolution has created an imbalance in UK politics Scottish welsh norther Irish and London MP’s can vote on issues that do not affect their constituents but do impact other people

Question 11

wasted votes

Answer 11

any votes cast for a candidate who does not win in a constituency play no role in the selection of representatives in parliament meaning that they are effectively wasted

Question 12

safe seats

Answer 12

some constituencies elect a candidate from the same party in every election and the support required to win the constituency is so high voters see no point in voting for a different party

Question 13

un-representative

Answer 13

differences in the concentration of support across the UK mean that the result of elections does not reflect the way the public voted

Question 14

winner’s bonus

Answer 14

the system exaggerates the support received by the most popular party, which means the party receives more seats than is proportional to the number of votes received, thus boosting its majority in parliament.

Question 15

discriminates against parties with widespread support

Answer 15

parties with support spread across the UK but not concentrated in a geographic area will find it difficult to gain seats and therefore representation, such as the greens, Liberal Democrats and UKIP

Question 16

minority constituencies

Answer 16

in these constituencies, and MP wins the most votes but does not gain more than 50% of the total votes, meaning a majority of the public did not vote for their representatives

Question 17

Two-Party system

Answer 17

it favours parties with a lot of support spread evenly across he country and generally results in one of the two main parties forming the government and other forming an opposition or government in waiting

Question 18

Lack of meaningful choice

Answer 18

Only 2 parties have a realistic chance of getting a majority in the house of commons, this doesn’t represent specific needs of some people.

Question 19

Elitist pressure groups

Answer 19

Only a small number of pressure groups tend to dominate any political debate at the expense of other interests

• insider status
• size of membership
• wealth
• public profile.

Question 20

weaknesses of electoral commission

Answer 20

it is reactive rather than proactive, loopholes over spending and the use of social media that the commission has no power to regulate or ability to control

Question 21

lack of entrenched rights

Answer 21

without a codified constitution key rights can be easily be overturned by the government without effective redress through the judicial system, undermines a key principle of democracy that citizen rights are protected from government abuse