The Church of England, commonly called the English Church, is the established Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the origin of the Anglican tradition, which combines features of both Reformed and Catholic Christian practices. Its adherents are called Anglicans.
The legislatures of the United Kingdom are derived from a number of different sources. The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body for the United Kingdom and the British overseas territories with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland each having their own devolved legislatures. Each of the three major jurisdictions of the United Kingdom has its own laws and legal system.
A supermajority is a requirement for a proposal to gain a specified level of support which is greater than the threshold of one-half used for a simple majority. Supermajority rules in a democracy can help to prevent a majority from eroding fundamental rights of a minority, but can also hamper efforts to respond to problems and encourage corrupt compromises at times when action is taken. Changes to constitutions, especially those with entrenched clauses, commonly require supermajority support in a legislature. Parliamentary procedure requires that any action of a deliberative assembly that may alter the rights of a minority have a supermajority requirement, such as a two-thirds vote. In consensus democracy the supermajority rule is applied in most cases.
Delegated legislation or secondary legislation in the United Kingdom is law that is not enacted by a legislative assembly such as the UK Parliament, but made by a government minister, a delegated person or an authorised body under powers given to them by an Act of Parliament.
A parochial church council (PCC) is the executive committee of a Church of England parish and consists of clergy and churchwardens of the parish, together with representatives of the laity. It has its origins in the vestry committee, which looked after both religious and secular matters in a parish. It is a corporate charitable body.
The right to freedom of religion in the United Kingdom is provided for in all three constituent legal systems, by devolved, national, European, and international law and treaty. Four constituent nations compose the United Kingdom, resulting in an inconsistent religious character, and there is no state church for the whole kingdom.
Norwich North is a constituency in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament represented by Alice Macdonald, member of the Labour Party, after winning the seat in the 2024 general election.
Bootle is a constituency which has been represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament, since 2015 by Peter Dowd of the Labour Party.
The General Synod is the tricameral deliberative and legislative organ of the Church of England. The synod was instituted in 1970, replacing the Church Assembly, and is the culmination of a process of rediscovering self-government for the Church of England that had started in the 1850s.
An electorate or electoral district is a geographic constituency used for electing a member (MP) to the New Zealand Parliament. The size of electorates is determined such that all electorates have approximately the same population.
In the Anglican Communion, the model of government is the 'Bishop in Synod', meaning that a diocese is governed by a bishop acting with the advice and consent of representatives of the clergy and laity of the diocese. In much of the Communion the body by which this representation is achieved is called the diocesan synod.
The House of Laity is the lower house in the tricameral General Synod of the Church of England legislature. They are responsible for representing the laity of the Church of England in the legislature. They are indirectly elected every 5 years by members on the Church of England's electoral roll via the representatives on the Diocesan Synods.
Christianity has been the largest religion in Ireland since the 5th century. After a pagan past of Antiquity, missionaries converted the Irish tribes to Christianity in quick order. This produced a great number of saints in the Early Middle Ages, as well as a faith interwoven with Irish identity for centuries since − though less so in recent times.
The Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act 1919 is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that enables the Church of England to submit primary legislation called measures, for passage by Parliament. Measures have the same force and effect as acts of Parliament. The power to pass measures was originally granted to the Church Assembly, which was replaced by the General Synod of the Church of England in 1970 by the Synodical Government Measure 1969.
The annual meeting of parishioners is held yearly in every parish of the Church of England to elect churchwardens and deputies for the forthcoming year. The meeting must be held by 31 May and is commonly held immediately prior to the annual meeting of the parochial church council. It is the last remnant of the old vestry meeting.
There are five types of elections in the United Kingdom: elections to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, elections to devolved parliaments and assemblies, local elections, mayoral elections, and police and crime commissioner elections. Within each of those categories, there may also be by-elections. Elections are held on Election Day, which is conventionally a Thursday, and under the provisions of the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Act 2022 the timing of general elections can be held at the discretion of the prime minister during any five-year period. All other types of elections are held after fixed periods, though early elections to the devolved assemblies and parliaments can occur in certain situations. The five electoral systems used are: the single member plurality system (first-past-the-post), the multi-member plurality, the single transferable vote, the additional member system, and the supplementary vote.
The Marriage (Wales) Act 2010 c.6 is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom. Introduced as a private member's bill by David Rowe-Beddoe, Baron Rowe-Beddoe and sponsored by Alun Michael MP, it received royal assent on 18 March 2010. It created the Church in Wales's counterpart to mirror the Church of England Marriage Measure 2008 No. 1 and brought the Church in Wales's marriage regulations into line with those of the Church of England.
A Church of England measure is primary legislation that is made by the General Synod of the Church of England and approved by the Parliament of the United Kingdom under section 3 of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act 1919.
The Interpretation Measure 1925, No. 1 is a Church of England measure passed by the General Synod of the Church of England legislating how to interpret future Church of England measures - later it would also cover Church of England instruments.
The Synodical Government Measure 1969 No. 2 is a Church of England measure passed by the National Assembly of the Church of England replacing the National Assembly with the General Synod of the Church of England.
