The Northern Ireland Executive is the administrative branch of the Northern Ireland Assembly, the devolved legislature for Northern Ireland. It is answerable to the Assembly and was established according to the terms of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, which followed the Good Friday Agreement (or Belfast Agreement). The executive is referred to in the legislation as the Executive Committee of the Assembly and is an example of a consociationalist government.
The Northern Ireland Executive consists of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister(a diarchy) and various ministers with individual portfolios and remits. The main Assembly parties appoint most ministers in the executive, except for the Minister of Justice who is elected by a cross-community vote. It is one of three devolved governments in the United Kingdom, the others being the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government.
Read more about Northern Ireland Executive: Ministers, Structure, Procedure, Strategies, Executive Committee
Famous quotes containing the words northern ireland, northern, ireland and/or executive:
“... in Northern Ireland, if you don’t have basic Christianity, rather than merely religion, all you get out of the experience of living is bitterness.”
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“In civilization, as in a southern latitude, man degenerates at length, and yields to the incursion of more northern tribes.”
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“... the wife of an executive would be a better wife had she been a secretary first. As a secretary, you learn to adjust to the boss’s moods. Many marriages would be happier if the wife would do that.”
—Anne Bogan, U.S. executive secretary. As quoted in Working, book 1, by Studs Terkel (1973)