The Government are/ the Government is?

[nonmifairidere]

The former always grates. Government is collective noun, so the latter is correct, surely.

Anyone?

US uses plural, UK single.

I have read about it in grammar books

Is, I thought.

Am a civil servant. We're told to use the singular.

I would use is

The Government is

Members of the Government/Government ministers are

We did this in my English GCSE earlier in the week. I think it is "are" for plural and "is" for singular so

The children in my DDs class are going to the park - because there is more than one child

My DDs class is going to the park - because there is only 1 class

Thanks, didn't know about US usage. I was a civil servant so 'is' was standard, but I hear 'are' used frequently.

I think we tend to use "are" when speaking because we think of a government as a group of people but it is a single unit so "is" would be correct.

What do Canadians do? I always use is for singular, are for plural. However, I live in Canada so do they follow the UK or the US.

The Government is doing nothing useful to solve the current financial crisis...

The Government are a bunch of total bell-ends...

It all depends on the context, really

US usage is generally to use the singular with government: The government is . . .

This link also has information about British usage.

oxforddictionaries.com/us/words/matching-verbs-to-collective-nouns-american

Not only do we only ever use the singular ("the family is," not "the family are") in the US, the whole mistake is a puzzling one to us. We don't say it by accident either, and we are confused when the English say the plural colloquially.

You never, never, ever hear the plural in the US. It is something I used to hear in the UK, but it is getting less common.