Hey everyone and welcome back to another episode of the
Understandable English Podcast. And today I will be talking
about the UK general election. So I'm going to explain what
that means, what it is and how the electoral system, so the
voting system or the democracy that we have in the UK works.
So I'm going to explain the process and a little bit about
this election in the UK. So after listening to this
podcast, you will understand how our system works in the UK, how
voting works and a little bit about this important election
which is coming up soon. OK, so the next big election in
the UK is coming up on July the 4th, so the 4th of July.
So in the UK, the election process is a big part of our
democracy. It's the time when citizens
across the nation come together to make their voices heard and
to try and make change in government.
So they vote for the party or the members of Parliament that
they think will best represent their views.
So represent it basically is the most similar to their views or
beliefs and that's the people that you should vote for.
So how does it work? Well, let's start with the
basics. The UK operates under a
parliamentary system and what this means is that voters, so
the the people, the public don't directly vote for the Prime
Minister. The Prime Minister is sort of
the head of parliament and the head of the country.
But instead we vote for members of Parliament, or as I call them
and most people call them, MPs for short.
And MP means Member of Parliament and these members
represent or or four different areas of the UK and the UK is
mapped out or divided into 650 parliamentary constituencies.
And what that means is that there are 650 places for members
of Parliament, and in each of these, 650 people vote for the
person that they want to represent their area in
Parliament, to pass laws and to vote on new laws and to really
try to make a change in the country.
These areas are different in size and demographics, but each
one of these areas has roughly or approximately the same amount
of voters or people within them when it is Election Day.
So the day that we vote illegible or people who are able
to vote head to their local polling or voting station and
they cast their ballots, what does that mean to cast your
ballot? That means to vote.
We vote on a piece of paper, and this piece of paper is called a
ballot. And when they're voting on their
ballot, they vote for a candidate or a person who is
wanting to become an MP or a member of Parliament, usually a
member of a political party, although there are also some
independent candidates that stand in many areas.
And these are candidates or people who do not represent a
political party, they represent themselves.
And during the day, you can turn up and vote from morning until
evening. And once the polls or the voting
closes and finishes, this is where the real drama and
excitement begins. The votes are counted so people
count up how many votes are for each person and the candidate
with the most votes becomes the Member of Parliament or MP for
that area and they represent all the people from their area in
the House of Commons, which is the main law making place in the
UK. This is the part where it can
get quite interesting. The party that wins the most
seats in the House of Commons usually can make the government,
so they form the government. If one party gets an outright
majority, so a clear majority most of the seats, their leader,
the party leader will become the Prime Minister.
However, if no one party wins a clear majority or most of the
votes and seats, it results in something that we call a hung
parliament. This is when it one party can't
make a government by themselves because they don't have a clear
victory. And in these cases, parties have
to negotiate or make a deal with one another to form a coalition
government. So when more than one party
works together to make a majority to make enough seats to
form a government, and in this government, the largest party
forms the government and the smaller parties support them and
help. That is the main process of how
things in the UK work and how democracy here works.
Once a government has been made, or one party or a coalition
government is made, the Prime Minister picks his ministers.
So people in charge of different areas, for example, there could
be a Minister of Health, a minister of defence, a minister
for the economy, There are all sorts of positions and the Prime
Minister can even make new positions as well.
OK, so now that we understand a little bit about how the process
works, I know it might be complicated with some of those
words, but if you have any problems just listen again to
that part of the podcast and even have a read online in your
own language about how the UK system or political system
works. But what about the next
election? So the election which is on the
4th of July. Currently the Conservative Party
and their leader Rishi Sunak is in government.
So they are in charge of the UK government and they have 345
seats out of 650. And the second largest party is
the Labour Party with their leader Keir Starmer, and they
have 206 seats in Parliament. But a lot of people think, and
it looks very clear, that in this election, this next
election, there could be some big changes, the polls.
So the predictions or ideas about this next election show
that the Labour Party will likely win and the Conservative
Party will lose. This is because of a lot of
different reasons from Brexit, so the problems associated with
Brexit, to the issues around how our country dealt with the COVID
pandemic, to lots and lots of problems within the Conservative
Party. They have changed their leader
many times in the last few years so it will be very interesting
to see how they do in this election and it could be a very,
very big and changing election for the UK.
For the last 14 years the Conservative Party has been in
government, they have been in charge of the UK, so it will be
the biggest change in a long time in my life to our
government if they don't win this election.
But we will have to wait and see.
So keep an eye out and have a look at the results when they
happen. Thank you very much for
listening to this episode of the Understandable English Podcast.
I hope it was interesting, informative and enjoyable for
you. Thank you for listening and have
a great day. I'll talk to you soon.