Royal prerogative

The Royal Prerogative is the formal powers of the Monarchs within the executive process of politics in the UK. These powers are part of common law.

Since the Great Britain has a constitutional monarchy, the work that is done by the monarchs in politics is rather symbolic. The work of the monarchs within the remit of the royal prerogative is on the behalf of elected ministers. In theory, the monarch has the right to e.g. grant pardons; actually this power is exercised by the Home Secretary/Prime Minister in reality in their own right or on through the advice they provide to the Queen which she is bound constitutionally to follow.

Historically, certain royal functions could be exercised only in certain ways. The Monarch could decide questions of title to land and punish felonies through common law courts. The Monarch possessed a residual power of administering justice through his Council. In the 17th century, disputes came up over the undefined residue of prerogative power. The conflict was resolved after the execution of two English Kings.

It that the bulk of prerogative powers could be exercised only through the advice of ministers responsible to Parliament. The he monarch retained formal power of appointment and removal of ministers and ministries but the development of collective ministerial responsibility made it more and more difficult for the Monarch to exercise his power freely against the will of the Prime Minister. The ability of ministers to rely on prerogative powers continues to give rise to problems of accountability though.

The royal prerogatives are as following:

[Firstly], the Queen has the right to appoint a Prime Minister. However, in the C21st this is convention as opposed to reality. In fact, after an election, the Queen chooses the leader of the majority party to lead the Commons. However, what happens if the Prime Minister refuses to quit after losing a vote of no confidence is unclear – as it has never happened in recent political history. Theoretically, the monarch can exercise powers of appointment and dismissal. How this would fit in with a democracy is difficult to decide.

[Secondly]The monarch has other powers of appointment (ministers, peers, senior C of E officials, head of BBC, senior civil servants etc) In reality these are chosen by the Prime Minister; only the Order of the Garter and the Order of Merit are at the personal disposal of the Queen. Therefore, a vast amount of power with regards to senior appointments rests with the Prime Minister.

[Thirdly]The Queen opens and dissolves Parliament. She also approves all statutes of law. In reality, the date of a general election is set by the Prime Minister and the Queen, in the State Opening of Parliament, simply reads out the proposed bills for the next 5 years of a government and plays no part in deciding them. No monarch has refused to give the Royal Assent to a government bill (passed at this stage by both the Commons and Lords) since 1707. Now it would appear to be completely untenable that the Queen would refuse to sign a government bill that had passed the Commons, select committees, the Lords etc. It would spark off a major constitutional crisis.

In 2007 and 2009 there were proposals to reform the Royal Prerogative. Specific proposals were made for certain elements of the prerogative, such as the deployment of Armed Forces overseas etc. and the Government published a review of Executive Royal Prerogative Power

http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons/lib/research/briefings/snpc-03861.pdf http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/royal_prerogative.htm Ministry of Justice, The Governance of Britain – Review of the Executive Royal Prerogative Powers: Final Report, October 2009, paras 26-28