Government#
parliamentary constitutional monarchy; a Commonwealth realm
System |
parliamentary constitutional monarchy; a Commonwealth realm |
Capital |
London |
Head of state |
King CHARLES III (since 8 September 2022) |
Head of government |
Prime Minister Keir STARMER (since 5 July 2024) |
Legislature |
legislature name: UK Parliament; legislative structure: bicameral |
Judiciary |
highest court(s): Supreme Court (consists of 12 justices, including the court president and deputy president); judge selection and term of office: judge candidates selected by an independent committee of several judicial commissions, then recommended to the prime minister, and appointed by the monarch; justices serve for life; subordinate courts: England and Wales: Court of Appeal (civil and criminal divisions); High Court; Crown Court; County Courts; Magistrates’ Courts; Scotland: Court of Sessions; Sheriff Courts; High Court of Justiciary; tribunals; Northern Ireland: Court of Appeal in Northern Ireland; High Court; county courts; magistrates’ courts; specialized tribunals |
Constitution |
history: uncoded; partly statutes, partly common law and practice; amendment process: proposed as a bill for an Act of Parliament by the government, by the House of Commons, or by the House of Lords; passage requires agreement by both houses and by the monarch (Royal Assent) |
Independence |
no official date of independence: 927 (minor English kingdoms unite); 3 March 1284 (enactment of the Statute of Rhuddlan uniting England and Wales); 1536 (Act of Union incorporates England and Wales); 1 May 1707 (Acts of Union unite England, Scotland, and Wales as Great Britain); 1 January 1801 (Acts of Union unite Great Britain and Ireland as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland); 6 December 1921 (Anglo-Irish Treaty formalizes partition of Ireland; six counties become Northern Ireland and remain part of the UK); 12 April 1927 (Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act establishes current name of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) |
Administrative divisions |
England: 24 two-tier counties, 32 London boroughs and 1 City of London or Greater London, 36 metropolitan districts, 59 unitary authorities (including 4 single-tier counties*); two-tier counties: Cambridgeshire, Cumbria, Derbyshire, Devon, East Sussex, Essex, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, Lancashire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk, North Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Somerset, Staffordshire, Suffolk, Surrey, Warwickshire, West Sussex, Worcestershire; London boroughs and City of London or Greater London: Barking and Dagenham, Barnet, Bexley, Brent, Bromley, Camden, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Greenwich, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Haringey, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Kingston upon Thames, Lambeth, Lewisham, City of London, Merton, Newham, Redbridge, Richmond upon Thames, Southwark, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest, Wandsworth, Westminster; metropolitan districts: Barnsley, Birmingham, Bolton, Bradford, Bury, Calderdale, Coventry, Doncaster, Dudley, Gateshead, Kirklees, Knowlsey, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, North Tyneside, Oldham, Rochdale, Rotherham, Salford, Sandwell, Sefton, Sheffield, Solihull, South Tyneside, St. Helens, Stockport, Sunderland, Tameside, Trafford, Wakefield, Walsall, Wigan, Wirral, Wolverhampton; unitary authorities: Bath and North East Somerset; Bedford; Blackburn with Darwen; Blackpool; Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole; Bracknell Forest; Brighton and Hove; City of Bristol; Buckinghamshire; Central Bedfordshire; Cheshire East; Cheshire West and Chester; Cornwall; Darlington; Derby; Dorset; Durham County*; East Riding of Yorkshire; Halton; Hartlepool; Herefordshire*; Isle of Wight*; Isles of Scilly; City of Kingston upon Hull; Leicester; Luton; Medway; Middlesbrough; Milton Keynes; North East Lincolnshire; North Lincolnshire; North Northamptonshire; North Somerset; Northumberland*; Nottingham; Peterborough; Plymouth; Portsmouth; Reading; Redcar and Cleveland; Rutland; Shropshire; Slough; South Gloucestershire; Southampton; Southend-on-Sea; Stockton-on-Tees; Stoke-on-Trent; Swindon; Telford and Wrekin; Thurrock; Torbay; Warrington; West Berkshire; West Northamptonshire; Wiltshire; Windsor and Maidenhead; Wokingham; York; Northern Ireland: 5 borough councils, 4 district councils, 2 city councils; borough councils: Antrim and Newtownabbey; Ards and North Down; Armagh City, Banbridge, and Craigavon; Causeway Coast and Glens; Mid and East Antrim; district councils: Derry City and Strabane; Fermanagh and Omagh; Mid Ulster; Newry, Murne, and Down city councils: Belfast; Lisburn and Castlereagh; Scotland: 32 council areas; council areas: Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Angus, Argyll and Bute, Clackmannanshire, Dumfries and Galloway, Dundee City, East Ayrshire, East Dunbartonshire, East Lothian, East Renfrewshire, City of Edinburgh, Eilean Siar (Western Isles), Falkirk, Fife, Glasgow City, Highland, Inverclyde, Midlothian, Moray, North Ayrshire, North Lanarkshire, Orkney Islands, Perth and Kinross, Renfrewshire, Shetland Islands, South Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire, Stirling, The Scottish Borders, West Dunbartonshire, West Lothian; Wales: 22 unitary authorities; unitary authorities: Blaenau Gwent, Bridgend, Caerphilly, Cardiff, Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, Conwy, Denbighshire, Flintshire, Gwynedd, Isle of Anglesey, Merthyr Tydfil, Monmouthshire, Neath Port Talbot, Newport, Pembrokeshire, Powys, Rhondda Cynon Taff, Swansea, The Vale of Glamorgan, Torfaen, Wrexham |
Departments#
TODO. Ministries and authoritative sites, to be filled out.
Hierarchy#
How power is wired. The diagram below carries the generic template; refine the boxes and edges to match the current regime.
flowchart TD
HoS["Head of State"]
HoG["Head of Government"]
Leg["Legislature"]
Jud["Judiciary"]
Cab["Cabinet"]
Foreign["Foreign Affairs"]
Interior["Interior"]
Defense["Defense"]
Finance["Finance"]
Justice["Justice"]
HoS --> HoG
HoG --> Cab
Cab --> Foreign
Cab --> Interior
Cab --> Defense
Cab --> Finance
Cab --> Justice
HoS -.- Leg
HoS -.- Jud
Resources#
Public-facing portals the people use day to day. Operators monitor these for policy changes, official notices, and civil-registry data.
Resource |
Site |
Purpose |
|---|---|---|
National portal |
to be filled |
One-stop government services for citizens. |
Tax / revenue |
to be filled |
Income tax, VAT, customs. |
Civil registry |
to be filled |
Births, deaths, marriages, national ID. |
Immigration |
to be filled |
Visas, residency, naturalisation. |
Health |
to be filled |
Public health, advisories, vaccination records. |
Education |
to be filled |
Curricula, school directories, transcripts. |
Statistics |
to be filled |
Census, economic indicators, opendata. |
Police / emergency |
to be filled |
Reporting, missing persons, emergency contacts. |