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Hi, everyone. And welcome back to Britain under the Microscope. 欢迎回来【闲话英伦】. Hi, 安澜.
Hi Lulu, hi everyone.
安澜, can I propose a topic today?
Yeah, of course.
You know I've been following up on the latest news in the UK, yeah.
I think I know what topic you would propose.
It looks a bit messy.
It is very, very messy.
And it's also quite difficult for people who are not British to really understand. So I thought it would be an interesting idea for us to actually talk about the government and the political system in the UK to give people just a general idea.
Yeah, well, to be honest it’s confusing for us as well. But I think if you don't understand the British government and the British political system, it can get very, very confusing.
So first things first, your political system is called君主立宪制, 叫constitutional monarchy.
Yes, we have a monarch, we have a king. But the king's actual power isn't really that big, they have a lot of authority, they have a lot of influence, but no real political power, so political power goes to our government, our Parliament.
All that I know about your government is that your government consists of two houses. 我就知道英国有上院和下院, 上院叫什么House of Lords.
The House of Lords and the House of Commons.
House of Commons.
So there is no actual Constitution in the UK, is there? it’s not like in United States.
No, unlike many countries, the UK doesn't actually have a constitution. Instead, it based on presidents.
我听过一个叫做constitutional conventions, 叫宪法惯例, 就是没有实际明文的宪法, 但是有宪法惯例.
So for example, we would have one law and then the judges would decide on how to interpret that law, and then there might be another law, then another law, then another ruling, and eventually it builds up into just common practice. And this has been going on for centuries.
So it's basically just referring back to how it was done before…
And changing when it needs to be changed.
But it wasn't always like that, was it? Like before at one time in your history, obviously, king or queen, the monarch did have actual power.
Oh, yeah. I would say that was years and years and years ago because there's actually been some kind of parliament since the 13th century over 750 years ago, we had a few rather bad kings, so the nobles actually tried to limit their power. And the first attempt to doing this was the Magna Carta.
Magna Carta meaning The Great Charter.
The Great Charter.
中文翻译叫大宪章.
The Magna Carta, which means “great charter” in Latin, was drawn up by English barons (nobles) and church leaders to limit the king’s power. In 1215 they forced the tyrannical King John to agree to the charter. The Magna Carta stated that the king must follow the law and could not simply rule as he wished.
Yeah, so that was 1215, and you might hear British people talk about Magna Carta, but to be honest, not many people really understand what it was.
It’s probably what you learned in history classes.
But there are some very important things that were added to the Magna Carta including if you are convicted of a crime, you have the right to be judged by a jury.
So let's bring it back to the actual political system. We talked about the two houses. 我们就来说说英国这个议会制度, 首先说上院 House of Lords, obviously, this consists of lords.
Yes, so historically they were upper class lords, so they were the aristocracy, but nowadays it has slightly changed. There are around 700 lords and ladies, but most of them are what we call Life Peers.
Life peers, I think I've heard of this翻译叫做 “终身贵族”, 听起来好像很高大上, but it actually means they are only nobleman or noble woman for their lifetime.
Yeah, so they'll have the title for their lifetime, but their children won't have it. So this is the difference between what we call Hereditary Peers.
就是Life Peers实际上是不能世袭的, 像Hereditary Peers是可以父传子，子传孙这样的.
Yeah
但是life peer… it's just…it’s not so elitist.
The idea of having a