4. Name all the rights and immunities which each of the two Houses has. How do you understand them?

Example: Freedom of speech means the right to express one’s opinion.

6. Match the person with its definition:

Definition:

1.- he/she represents an area in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland

2.-acts as a chairman

3.-MPs without special positions in their parties

4.-he/she sits on the government bench next to his or her ministers

5.-the minister responsible for the relations with other countries and security is

6.-the one responsible for law and security

7.-he/she deals with financial matters

8.-a member who specializes in a particular area of government.

People:

a)Home Secretary

b)backbenchers

c)Speaker

d)an MP

e)Prime Minister

f)Chancellor of the Exchequer

g)a member of the Shadow Cabinet

h)Foreign Secretary

5. Guess (догодайтесь) the names of ministers according to the names of the Departments they are in charge of:

The head of the Home Office is the Home Secretary ;

The head of the Foreign Office is the Foreign Secretary;

The head of the Treasury is the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

6. Make a drawing of the arrangement of seats in the House of Commons. Discuss it in class.

7. Imagine that you are a representative of the district you come from. Introduce yourself (name, age, education, current occupation etc.), speak about your constituency (situation, size, population) and figure out its problems. Then, propose the ways of solving these problems.

8. Render the following text in Russian (10 minutes).

The British Parliament is bicameral, i.e. consists of two chambers: the House of Lords and the House of Commons and the Queen is the official head of the Parliament. But the monarch does not participate in the British government, has no real political power and rules with the support of the Parliament. The Parliament makes all the decisions and thePrime Ministeris the figure that runs the country.

The House of Lords appeared first as King's council of the nobility.

The House of Commons originated later, in the second half of the 14th century." Commons" were the representatives of different local communities.

When speaking about General Election, election to the House of Commons is meant. Of its 659 members 529 represent constituencies in England, 40 – in Wales, 72 – in Scotland and 18 – in Northern Ireland (119 MPs are women).

Making new laws: Bills and Acts

1.Read and translate the following text in writing (10minutes).

When Parliament is in session, every word spoken by a member is faithfully transcribed, and published in a document called a Hansard. 

Hansard (the Official Report) is an edited record of what was said in Parliament (in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords). It also includes votes, written ministerial statements and written answers to parliamentary questions. The report is published daily covering the preceding day, and is followed by weekly and final versions.

***

Hansard is the name of the printed transcriptsofparliamentarydebates in theWestminster systemofgovernment. It is named after Luke Hansard, an early printer and publisher of these transcripts.

*** "Хансард" (назван по имени Л. Хансарда (Luke Hansard), впервые опубликовавшего отчёт о заседании палаты общин в Англии в 1774; официальный отчёт о заседании парламента в Австралии, Новой Зеландии, Британии, Канаде)

2. Think of the way a Bill should go to become a law.

3. Guess the meanings of the following phrases and match them with their Russian equivalents:

to refuse a Bill обсудить законопроект

to introduce a Bill внести поправку в законопроект

to debate a Bill отложить принятие законопроекта

to amend a Bill принять законопроект

to delay the passage of a Bill выдвинуть законопроект

to pass a Bill отклонить законопроект

4. Put the stages of making a Bill in a logic order (See task 2).

Vocabulary

a Bill	билль, законопроект
a Public Bill	общественный законопроект
a Private Bill [’praɪvɪt]	частный законопроект
an Act of Parliament	парламентский акт
the Royal Assent [ə’sent]	королевская санкция
a Statute Law [’stætʃu:t ]	статутный закон(писаный закон)
a Money Bill	финансовый законопроект
an amendment [ə’mendmənt]	поправка

3. Read the following text and translate it into Russin.

Every year Parliament passes about a hundred laws directly, by making Acts of Parliament.

No new law can be passed until it has completed a number of stages in the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The Monarch also has to give a Bill the Royal Assent, which is now just a formality. Since 1707 no sovereign has refused a Bill. Whilst a law is still going through Parliament it is called a Bill. There are two main types of Bills - Public Bills which deal with matters of public importance, and Private Bills which deal with local matters and individuals.

When a Bill is introduced in the House of Commons, it receives a formal first reading. It is then printed and read a second time, when it is debated but not amended. After the second reading the Bill is referred to a committee, either a special committee made up of certain members of the House, or to the House itself as a committee. Here it is discussed in detail and amended, if necessary. The Bill is then presented for a third reading and is debated. If the Bill is passed by the Commons it goes to the Lords, and provided it is not rejected by them, it goes through the same procedure as in the Commons. After receiving the Royal Assent the Bill becomes an Act of Parliament. In order to be enforced, it must be published in Statute form becoming a part of Statute Law. The power of the Lords to reject a Bill has been severely limited. A Money Bill must be passed by the Lords without amendment within a month of being presented in the House. The Act of 1949 provides that any Public Bill passed by the Commons in two successive parliamentary sessions and rejected both times by the Lords, may be presented for the Royal Assent, even though it has not been passed by the Lords. The Lords, therefore, can only delay the passage of a Bill, they cannot reject it.