Cabinet of the Caldan Union

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The Cabinet of the Caldan Union is a body of Ministers of the Crown that, in accordance with the Constitution and along with the Sovereign, forms the government of the Union. Legally speaking, the Cabinet is a committee of the Queen's Privy Council. At one time, it also constituted the senior level of the Ministry. However, ever since the second government of Minerva Karamanlis, the Cabinet and the Ministry have been co-terminal. The Cabinet is also often referred to as the Government, though this term might also be used to refer to all federal state institutions and Members of Parliament and Senators belonging to the political party forming the government are referred to as Government MPs or Government Senators. The term Administration is used largely synonymously but generally includes senior political advisers, though not the nonpartisan Civil Service. A given Cabinet is referred to by the name of the current prime minister. Hence, the current Cabinet, led by Prime Minister James Calvert, is referred to as the Calvert Cabinet, the Calvert Government, the Calvert Administration or the Calvert Ministry. While technically and historically distinct, the four terms are nearly identical in modern Caldan usage.

Composition

Queen-in-Council

The Government of the Caldan Union, referred to domestically as Her Majesty's Government, is constitutionally defined as the Queen acting on the advice of her Privy Council. This is what is known as the Queen-in-Council. The Privy Council consists of all current or former Cabinet ministers, current and former Leaders of the Opposition, current and former Speakers of the House of Representatives, current and former Presidents of the Senate, current and former justices of the Supreme Court, current and former provincial governors, current and former provincial premiers, current and former Chiefs of the Defence Staff, members of the royal family over the age of 21, current and former presidents of the College of Peers, current and former Lord Chamberlains of the Household, current and former leaders of sizable third parties, and current and former members of the Caldan Security and Intelligence Review Agency. Except for certainly largely ceremonial occasions, the entire Privy Council rarely meets. Instead, responsible government requires that the Queen receive constitutional advice from those ministers who currently enjoy the confidence of the House of Representatives. Thus, the Cabinet is the Committee of the Privy Council which actually advises the Queen.

It is the responsibility of the Queen to appoint a prime minister to lead the government, one capable of enjoying the confidence of the House of Representatives. Where a party or coalition holds a clear majority, this will always be their leader. However, when there is a hung parliament, with no sign of a coalition agreement, the Queen must exercise her judgment. The prime minister is the head of the Cabinet and may appoint its members from among current MPs and Senators, generally the leading members of the prime minister's party. The Queen also accepts the resignation of a departing prime minister and swears in all ministers.

Selection and structure

The Queen appoints to the Cabinet persons chosen by the prime minister. Every member of the Cabinet must either be a member of the House of Representatives or the Senate. Aside from that, the composition of the Cabinet is largely a political a decision, left to the prime minister and the internal politics of the governing party or coalition. Cabinets are typically designed to be representative. Efforts are made to ensure there is at least one minister from each province. Prime ministers also typically try to include racial and gender diversity in their Cabinet choices. A political party's internal factional politics must be addressed. A Cabinet normally includes the prime minister's most significant factional rivals. If it does not, this often leads to disunity in the government and the perpetual threat of a leadership challenge. Prime ministers also consider the appropriateness of a Cabinet portfolio for a particular minister, appointing ministers with a long-term policy interest in the portfolio or even pre-political professional qualifications. For example, the minister of health is almost always a medical doctor and the Attorney General is almost always a lawyer. A large majority of ministers are drawn from the House of Representatives. Typically, only a handful come from the Senate.

The size and structure of the Cabinet is not fixed. However, it tends to be relatively stable from government to government. The last major alignment occurred in 2007 under Minerva Karamanlis. For much of the 20th century, the Cabinet was expanding steadily in size. Under Sam Stevenson, the Cabinet reached its largest size to date with 50 ministers. His successor, Noel Cumberbatch, reduced the Cabinet to 36 and Vincenzo Lacau reduced it to a 20th century low of 23. Minerva Karamanlis raised it to 33 and it has not changed much since. The current Cabinet has 37 members.

The Cabinet is divided into committees. The Treasury Board, overseeing the expenditure of public monies, is one of the most powerful. Other committees focus on Economic Growth, Foreign Affairs, Atlantic Affairs, Security, Relations with the Former Provinces, and Environment. Under Amber Trinh, there was a Priorities and Planning Committee, known sometimes as the inner cabinet, which determined the overall direction of government. However, Oliver Welton abolished that committee and it has not been recreated.

Precedence and roles

Each minister of the Crown is responsible for heading a government department or agency, sometimes anachronistically referred to as a ministry. The most important minister is the Prime Minister, who generally holds no other portfolio. The second most important is the Deputy Prime Minister who normally also holds another ministerial office. Protocol dictates that the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister have the greatest precedence in the Cabinet. The rank of other ministers in the order of precedence is determined by when they were appointed to the Privy Council. If they were appointed on the same day, it is determined by the date of their election to Parliament. If that is also the same, precedence is determined by their age. The formal order of precedence has little to do with the political important of Cabinet positions. The ministers of finance, foreign affairs, and justice are consistently viewed as being of especial importance.

There are some posts of Cabinet rank which do not involve heading an executive department, such as the Leader of the Government in the House of Representatives and the President of the Privy Council. The Prime Minister is also able to appoint ministers of state to handle a specific problem without creating an entire government department or to lead an effort that involves multiple departments. Ministers of state may also be created without being given a specific portfolio. Unlike in some nations, ministers of state are considered full members of Cabinet.

Ministers are supported by parliamentary secretaries, who assist them in parliament, and by deputy ministers, senior civil servants within their departments. Deputy ministers are equivalent to permanent secretaries or departmental secretaries in some other nations.

Responsibilities

Under the Caldan system of constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy, the advice tendered the Queen by the Cabinet is generally binding. Nonetheless, in the formal sense, the Royal Prerogative belongs to the Crown and not any of the ministers. A few matters are also generally accepted to be within the Queen's personal prerogative, but this is not a constitutional term and remains somewhat controversial. The Queen might be required to exercise significant discretion in a constitutional crisis. There are some duties which must be personally performed by the Queen. The last time royal assent has been denied to any bill passed by Parliament was in 1922 when James II refused assent to the Importation Act of 1822.

In addition to constituting the federal executive, the Cabinet also constitutes the leadership of the majority party in the House of Representatives. Legislation proposed by the Cabinet very rarely fails to pass. The Cabinet thoroughly dominates the legislative process in the House of Representatives. However, bills passed by the House may still be rejected by the Senate. Such bills only become law if the House passes them again with a supermajority. Thus, when a governing party has only a small majority in the House of Representatives and is weak in the Senate, it can have difficulty enacting its legislative agenda.

The Queen-in-Council is responsible for appointing members of various executive agencies, heads of Crown corporations, justices of the Supreme Court, ambassadors, and other public officials. Warrants for Royal Commissions and public inquiries are also issued by the Queen-in-Council. With the growth of the administrative state, the appointment power is a crucial one. However, the traditional independence of the Civil Service, the nonpartisan nature of commissions and public inquiries, and the requirements for representative and professional expertise in many executive agencies limits the potential use of the appointment power for partisan purposes.

Cabinet meetings are kept confidential for 30 years. Once a decision is reached, all Cabinet members must publicly support it. Where these rules are broken, the Prime Minister will typically remove the offending minister from office. However, on other occasions, the minister may resign to mount a leadership challenge. In 2000, Minerva Karamanlis resigned from her post as minister of finance to Vincenzo Lacau over the Lacau Government's approach to tax policy, the environment, and the social safety net. In 2018, Christopher Rutledge resigned from his post as Lola Foster's minister of employment to protest a two-state solution to the troubles in South Epheron. When Rutledge could not attain victory within the Labour Party, he and his supporters split to create the new Socialist Party and cost the Foster Government its majority. The situation is more complex when it is the Prime Minister who breached the confidentiality and unanimity of the Cabinet. There is generally no remedy unless the Prime Minister's behavior costs them the confidence of the party or coalition they lead. This has not happened since George Ryan lost the leadership of the Labour Party while heading a grand coalition government. When Ryan refused to resign the premiership and contested another election as head of the "National Coalition," Labour formally expelled him from party membership. Ryan's coalition was the immediate precursor of the modern National Party.

In the 20th and especially the 21st century, the Cabinet's power has been seen to be eclipsed by that of the Prime Minister personally. Oliver Welton is credited with consolidating power in the Office of the Prime Minister. Journalist Ellen Vuolo cited one dissatisfied minister claiming Welton treated Cabinet as a "glorified focus group" while making all meaningful decisions with his personal confidantes. When she took office, Lola Foster vowed a return to Cabinet government and the PMO has since declined in power significantly.

Shadow Cabinets

Each party in Opposition creates a shadow cabinet which mirrors the Cabinet proper. There is a shadow minister for each minister, offering alternative policies and critiquing the governments policy for that portfolio. A shadow cabinet, especially for the Official Opposition, is regarded as a government-in-waiting. While a party might alter reorganise the Cabinet or move their shadow ministers around after winning an election, shadow ministers can normally expect to be appointed to the corresponding Cabinet ministry if their party is voted into power.

Current Cabinet

The National Party won the election of 6 May 2021 with a majority of seats in the House of Representatives. The Cabinet was sworn in on 17 May with James Calvert appointed as prime minister.

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