Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Wireless and Television – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 10 November 1964.
Mr Christopher Chataway
, Lewisham North
12:00,
10 November 1964
When considering which election pledges to implement, will the right hon. Gentleman give particularly favourable consideration to this question? Would he agree that the allegation he made against the British Oxygen Company was a very serious one and that the late Mr. Morgan Phillips said in 1959 that he would not dream of suggesting a Tory plot in the British Oxygen works? Would the Prime Minister not agree that, in the circumstances, the fairest thing to do would be to set up the inquiry with full and searching powers that he promised?
In a general election, each constituency chooses an MP to represent it by process of election. The party who wins the most seats in parliament is in power, with its leader becoming Prime Minister and its Ministers/Shadow Ministers making up the new Cabinet. If no party has a majority, this is known as a hung Parliament. The next general election will take place on or before 3rd June 2010.
The political party system in the English-speaking world evolved in the 17th century, during the fight over the ascension of James the Second to the Throne. James was a Catholic and a Stuart. Those who argued for Parliamentary supremacy were called Whigs, after a Scottish word whiggamore, meaning "horse-driver," applied to Protestant rebels. It was meant as an insult.
They were opposed by Tories, from the Irish word toraidhe (literally, "pursuer," but commonly applied to highwaymen and cow thieves). It was used — obviously derisively — to refer to those who supported the Crown.
By the mid 1700s, the words Tory and Whig were commonly used to describe two political groupings. Tories supported the Church of England, the Crown, and the country gentry, while Whigs supported the rights of religious dissent and the rising industrial bourgeoisie. In the 19th century, Whigs became Liberals; Tories became Conservatives.
