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In certain legislative assemblies, especially those which are based on the Westminster system, a crossbencher is a member of the assembly who is a member of neither the governing parties nor the official Opposition.
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In the UK's House of Lords
A crossbencher is a member of the British House of Lords who is not aligned to any particular party. These include the Law Lords and former Speakers of the House of Commons, such as Lady Boothroyd and the late Lord Weatherill, who by convention are not aligned with any party. They are termed crossbenchers because they sit on neither the government benches nor the opposition benches but on benches that are perpendicular to the other sets and face the throne.
They do not take a collective position on issues, although they do elect from among themselves a Convenor for administrative purposes. As of 2008, the Convenor is Baroness D'Souza. The Convenor keeps them up-to-date with the business of the House. Although the Lords Spiritual (archbishops and some bishops of the Church of England) also have no party affiliation, they do not sit on the crossbenches (their seats are located on the government side of the Lords Chamber). Also the Lords Spiritual seats in the house are the only ones to have arm rests on them, this is to signify the Lords Spiritual special position.
The crossbenchers are often viewed as bringing specialist knowledge to the House, since they have usually been created peers for reasons other than party or political affiliation. 164 are Life Peers and 32 are hereditary peers.
From the 24th April 2007 the crossbenchers are 204 strong in the House of Lords - taking their numbers greater than the Conservatives for the first time, but fewer than the Labour party, which has 211 members (as of April 2007).
In other assemblies
Crossbenchers can play a particularly important role in assemblies where there is a small number of major parties (say, two or three), but none of the major parties hold enough seats to command a majority in their own right.
Often (but not always), the largest single party in the responsible house will be given the opportunity to govern, with the second-largest becoming the official Opposition. Smaller parties, as well as independent members, then have two choices. They can support a major party in its attempt to govern, perhaps by entering into a formal coalition or a slightly weaker agreement to guarantee confidence and supply; usually, they are then considered to be part of the government. Alternatively, they can remain outside the government; because they are not the official Opposition (even if they happen to be opposed to most Government policies), they are said to sit on the cross-benches.
Crossbenchers typically support or oppose Government legislation on a case-by-case basis. A minority government may be obliged to negotiate with crossbenchers to pass its legislation, and the crossbenchers are then said to hold the balance of power.
A refusal of a crossbencher to enter into a coalition or other arrangement with the government does not necessarily mean that the crossbencher will align with the opposition. The government's policy objectives may be nearer in practice to what that particular crossbencher wants. The general characteristic of crossbenchers is that they can act independently of other groups in the legislature.
References
- The Times, Monday April 16 2007 Days of Conservative domination in the Lords comes to an end.
External links
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 4 November 2008, at 08:03.
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