Prime Minister

The **Prime Minister of Atlantis** is the head of Her Majesty's Government in Atlantis. The Prime Minister (informal abbreviation: **PM**) and Cabinet (consisting of all the most senior ministers, who are government department heads) are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Monarch, to the Senate, to their political party and ultimately to the electorate. The current Prime Minister is Liberal Leader Tavares Silveira

The office is not established by any constitution or law but exists only by long-established convention, which stipulates that the Governor General must appoint as prime minister the person most likely to command the confidence of the Senate; this individual is typically the leader of the political party or coalition of parties that holds the largest number of seats in that chamber.

## Role

As the **"Head of Her Majesty's Government"** the modern Prime Minister leads the Cabinet (the Executive). In addition the Prime Minister leads a major political party and must command the confidence of the Senate in order to become and stay Prime Minister. Under the Atlantean system there is a partial fusion of powers rather than separation. In the Senate, the Prime Minister guides the law-making process with the goal of enacting the legislative agenda of their political party. In an executive capacity the Prime Minister appoints (and may dismiss) all other cabinet members and ministers, and co-ordinates the policies and activities of all government departments, and the staff of the Civil Service. The Prime Minister also acts as the public "face" and "voice" of Her Majesty's Government, both at home and abroad. Solely upon the advice of the Prime Minister, the Governor General exercises many statutory and prerogative powers, including high judicial, political, official, the conferral of, knighthoods, decorations and other honours. Although he or she may sometimes appear to be heavily under the influence of their aides, in reality the Prime Minister is in control.

## Office Holders

Maynard took a further blow when it transpired that two senior civil servants had conspired to released damaging information about the NCR and ANP. The two civil servants were swiftly sacked, leading to further comparisons between Maynard and a dictator. Soon afterwards, allegations were made by John against Home Secretary and Chief Whip Reece Lingard of leaking sensitive information to the media to discredit a potential party leadership rival. He was immediately dismissed, without a proper hearing, trial or tribunal, much to the dismay of later Party Chairman Harry Gold.
Maynard's Government recieved strong criticism for the continually delayed Budget, which didn't take place until late February. Discontent was brewing amongst the Parliamentary DLP and the Coalition, and the wider Atlantean population. There had been very little Government progress since the Governor General's Speech. On March 15th 2016, the Governor General threatened to dissolve Parliament and launch an election if a budget wasn't tabled soon.
When the budget was finally delivered on March the 16th, it received heavy criticism for being short, brief, vague and "half-hearted". The budget did not go down well with Liberal Party Senators, leading to the very public resignation of Jim Hayway, who savaged the Prime Minister in the process. There were talks of a coalition split. The PM and Tavares Silveira (Liberal Leader) try to negotiate a party-merger to prevent the Liberal backbenchers from causing a split, but this went down badly with both parties, who comprehensively rejected it. On March the 17th 2016, the Liberal Party backbench voted to split from the DLP-ALP Coalition, leaving John Maynard as a minority Prime Minister.
The ALP Minority Government had many early successes, narrowly surviving a motion of no-confidence with the support of the newly founded SDP and their new leader, former Health Secretary, Harry Gold, and passing a budget by a whisker. They also had successes with legalising marijuana, reforming healthcare and reorganising the armed forces, with Silveira achieving a moderate level of begrudging popularity.