The payroll vote is a term in the
British parliamentary system for
Members of Parliament who concurrently hold Government positions. It includes
minister
Minister may refer to:
* Minister (Christianity), a Christian cleric
** Minister (Catholic Church)
* Minister (government), a member of government who heads a ministry (government department)
** Minister without portfolio, a member of government w ...
s and
Parliamentary Private Secretaries
A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a Minister of the Crown, minister or Shadow Minister, shadow minister. They ar ...
. Even though the last are unpaid, they are widely regarded as being on the "first rung of the ministerial ladder".
[
] There is a commonly-observed convention in the
British constitution that all government ministers, including the
Prime Minister, be members of either the
House of Commons or the
House of Lords, although this is not always strictly observed.
Under the principle of
Cabinet collective responsibility, all ministers must publicly support the position of the Government. Any minister who wishes to vote against the Government in Parliament is obliged to resign from governmental office first. There is therefore a built-in bloc of guaranteed support for the Government on any given parliamentary vote. However, in the votes in the
House of Commons on
Brexit during the week of 11 March 2019, cabinet MPs voted against the government (and their own) stance without facing any public questioning from
Theresa May.
The size of this bloc is substantial and has been increasing over time.
Immediately after the
2005 general election, there were 89 ministers and 51 parliamentary private secretaries in the Commons, accounting for 40% of Labour Members of Parliament.
References
Parliament of the United Kingdom
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