Legislative Council
From Free net encyclopedia
A Legislative Council in British constitutional thought is the second-to-top tier of a government led by a Governor-General, Governor or a Lieutenant-Governor, inferior to an Executive Council and equal to or superior to a Legislative Assembly. Though the Legislative Council should in theory operate as a legislature of a governorate (not necessarily a colony) with either appointed or elected members or both, the separate development of governments in the British Empire and Commonwealth has seen the Councils evolve in to many different forms.
Unicameral legislatures
- Legislative Council of Brunei (unelected, now dissolved)
- Legislative Council of Hong Kong
- Legislative Council of Macao (Assembleia Legislativa, sometimes translated as Legislative Assembly)
- Legislative Council of Singapore (1946 to 1953, replaced by the Legislative Assembly)
- Legislative Council of the Straits Settlements (1867 to 1946, replaced by the Legislative Council of Singapore)
- Uganda Legislative Council (beame the National Assembly of Uganda in March 1962)
Part of a bicameral legislature
Usually in this case the Legislative Council functioned as an upper House of a bicameral legislature operating under the Westminster System. The lower house is sometimes called the Legislative Assembly, except in the Isle of Man, where it is the House of Keys, and in the Australian states of South Australia and Tasmania, where it is the House of Assembly.
- Australia:
- The New South Wales Legislative Council
- The Queensland Legislative Council (abolished in 1922)
- The South Australian Legislative Council
- The Tasmanian Legislative Council
- The Victorian Legislative Council
- The Western Australian Legislative Council.
- Bermuda: the Bermuda Legislative Council (renamed the Senate in 1980).
- Canada:
- The Legislative Council of Manitoba (abolished in 1876)
- The Legislative Council of Newfoundland (dissolved as part of the Commission of Government in 1934, and has not been summoned since)
- The Legislative Council of New Brunswick (abolished in 1892)
- The Legislative Council of Prince Edward Island (abolished in 1893)
- The Legislative Council of Nova Scotia (abolished in 1928)
- The Legislative Council of Quebec (abolished in 1968)
- The Legislative Council of Upper Canada (Ontario) (abolished by the Union Act of 1840)
- The Legislative Council of the Province of Canada (abolished at Confederation)
- India: The Vidhan Parishad in 5 of India's 28 states (Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Jammu and Kashmir), the Legislative Council serves as the upper house of a bicameral legislature.
- Isle of Man: the Legislative Council of the Isle of Man.
- New Zealand: the New Zealand Legislative Council (abolished in 1951).