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The rise of Parliament


King Charles I (1600-1649) believed that the monarch was appointed by God to rule and had absolute power. The elected English Parliament disagreed. The result was the Civil War, leading to the execution of the king in 1649. for the next 11 years, England was a republic, though Oliver Cromwell, the parliamentary leader and most important man in England, took more and more power until he himself became a dictator.

After his death, Parliament asked the executed king’s son to return to England. In spite of this, there was no return to the absolute rule of kings and no future monarch would ever seriously challenge the power of Parliament.


 

Empire and industry


During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Britain itself was peaceful. Abroad, however, it was aggressively expanding its Empire. Britain was a powerful and rich country because of its Empire and its industry. Cheap raw materials, produced by badly paid and unpaid workers, were imported from the colonies. The technological changes of the Industrial Revolution allowed Britain to manufacture products cheaply for export.

The Industrial revolution caused great social changes in Britain. Many people had moved from the land to the cities. These people now worked in the factories, an urban working class which was often very poor. In Queen Victoria’s reign (1837-1901), children, as young as four, had jobs in factories. Their parents did not have the vote and so could not change things. Many children worked in very bad conditions in Victoria’s reign. In 1833, it became illegal to employ children below the age of 13 for more than 48 hours per week.

The Reform Act of 1832 gave the vote to all men who owned the house, but it was not until 1918 that the right to vote was given to all men over 21 and to women over 30. Women under 30 had to wait until 1928 for the vote.

Britain at its most powerful had colonies in every continent, but the end of the Empire happened quickly, just after the Second World War (1939-1945). India, one of the most important colonies, became independent in 1948. In the 1960s, the African and Caribbean countries also became independent. British people began to realize that their country was no longer an imperial, world power but just one country in a European Community.


 

1. Read the text and be ready to discuss the following:

a) Why Britain is the Protestant country?

b) The move towards parliamentary democracy.

c) The rise and fall of the British Empire.

2. a) Did our country ever have any overseas colonies?

b) When were women given the vote in Russia?

Did it happen sooner or later than in Britain?

3. a) Choose one of the following dates and give a short

description of what happened in Britain:

1534, 1588, 1649, 1833, 1948

Chapter 3

POLITICS

Parliament

The British Parliament has two houses, or chambers: the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The House of Commons is the most powerful and decides national policy, but the House of Lords can ask the House of Commons to rewrite certain parts of a bill before it becomes a new law.



The House of Commons consists of Members of Parliament, MPs. Each MP is elected by voters in one constituency (region). There are 651 MPs, or seats, in the House of Commons (524 for England, 72 for Scotland, 32 for Wales and 17 for Northern Ireland). In 1994, there were only 59 women MPs.

The 1203 members of the House of Lords are not elected. Some are life peers: they are members of the House of Lords, but their sons or daughters cannot be members. Life peers are usually former members of the House of Commons. There are also a number of judges or bishops. The majority (774), however, are hereditary peers, the heads of aristocratic families. This means that most members of the House of Lords are there because of something their ancestors did. The Head of both Houses of Parliament is the Queen, but she has very little power. The House of Commons and the House of Lords meet in the Houses of Par-

liament, more commonly known as Westminster. The clock tower of the

Houses of Parliament is called Big Ben.

 


Date: 2015-12-11; view: 1825


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