Hung parliament - what will the Queen do?

[Kunetka]

I know there's already a thread on hung parliaments, but I wanted to specifically ask about the Queen's role if there is one.

The media don't seem to be talking about it, but if the politicians can't sort it out amongst themselves the Queen will have to pick a PM.

Republicans are getting hot and bothered about it (www.republic.org.uk/blog/?p=1180) but I'd rather she made the decision than the politicians doing grubby back room deals.

What does everybody else think?

The politicians will sort it out themselves I think, Queen needing to choose, highly unlikely.

I'd love to see that message from the Queen.

"To my loyal subjects; who shall Britain be Britain's next Prime Minister? Cameron, Brown or Clegg? One has only a single way to find out... FIGHT!"

You've not to look very far to see what a constitutional booby-trap PR and hung parliaments are. Belgium's PM has stepped down for the third time in less than two years because his coalition government collapsed on Friday. It took several months of 'sorting it out amongst themselves' to even get a parliament in the first place. In all of the resulting mess the Belgian king might not pick the PM personally but he does seem to be heavily involved in trying to get the thing resolved.

Shambles, basically.

stop scaremongering about Belgium fgs! There are tons of other countries with coalition governments, and all the Tories can talk about is Belgium!

Try harder - or better still stop scaremongering altogether! Tories wanted the markets to slide to prove their point - sorry, didn't happen. The markets have priced in a hung parliament for ages and say SO WHAT?

Very readable post about the mecahnics of a hung parliament. The Queen is referred to.

Recently, I wrote to Gordon Brown to complain about the monarchy being exempted from the Freedom of Information Act. I was moved to do this because of reports that Prince Charles is well known for meddling by showering government ministers with his so called 'spider' memos and I believe that undue influence bought to bear by Prince Charles should be in the public domain. The following is part of Gordon Brown's reply :

the governments view is that these changes are necessary to protect the constitutional conventions surrounding the monarchy. This includes the political impartiality of the monarchy, the sovereign's right and duty to counsel, encourage and warn her government, and the heir to the throne's right to be schooled in the business of government.

Notice the words 'impartiality' and 'right'. If the monarchy is indeed politically impartial why the need to exempt them from FOI? What is this 'right' they have? They are not elected, they are just born into one particular family.

The truth is that the monarchy is not impartial and that if there is a hung parliament the queen will have a huge undemocratic role to play. It is time that we as a nation let go of our emotional attachment to this family, who have no other special qualifications to do what they do other than their DNA, and become mature enough to become sovereign in our own country. If you feel as I do go to www.republic.org.uk and join the campaign.

vesela - I don't think it's 'scaremongering' to use a real-life situation to make a point. Belgium is a particularly dire example of what can happen when there is confusion about who has the right to rule, but it is a genuine one. Whether that arises through FPTP (less likely) or PR (more likely) we can't stick our heads in the sand and pretend it'll be OK.

The original question was about the role of the Queen. And, as can be seen in Belgium, the (also unelected) King is having to interfere much more in this matter than British people would be comfortable with if the situation was mirrored here.