Mr. President, Sir, Clause 10 says that there shall be a Council of Ministers with the Prime Minister as the Head to aid and advise the President in the exercise of his functions. Sir, there is no mention in this Clause as to how the Council of Ministers is to be created. Therefore I find, Sir, that an amendment has been moved to the effect that each Minister shall be elected by the Assembly by the principle of proportional representation by single transferable vote and the Council of Ministers shall be responsible to the Assembly. Now, Sir, we can safely divide this amendment into two parts; the first part is that the Ministers are to be elected by the Assembly; the second part is that the Cabinet of Ministers are to be responsible to the Assembly. As regards the second part, I entirely agree. If the Council of Ministers have no majority behind them in the Assembly they will not remain in office or if there is a vote of ‘no confidence’ against them, even then they will get out. Therefore this part of the amendment I can quite appreciate. But as regards the first part, namely, that the Ministers shall be elected by the Assembly, I am afraid, Sir, I have not been able to appreciate. If the Council of Ministers are to be elected by the members of the Assembly by proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote, then, Sir, what may happen? There may be a small party and if there is single transferable vote by proportional representation, that small Party may succeed in electing a Minister. Now, Sir, that party may not have the same political view as the majority party in the Assembly. Therefore in a Cabinet there may be Ministers with two divergent views and opinions. Now, Sir, if that happens there will be no team work in the Ministry and this cannot be called a stable Ministry. After all we have seen that the English system in this connection has been tried for centuries in England and it has worked well. What happens in England? The leader is summoned by the Head of the State, i.e. the King and is appointed Chief Minister or Prime Minister. This Chief Minister or Prime Minister has to submit the names of the other Ministers and in consultation with the Prime Minister the Head of the State or the King and is appoints all the Ministers. Then, in that case the ministry is stable; for when the Prime Minister has got the majority in the House, he will carry on, and if he has not, he will not. But to have two different kinds of ministers in the same Cabinet, I am afraid, I am not able to appreciate.
