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Now, this may be seem confusing. If the Commons expresses confidence in a government, does that not mean that the House governs, in a manner of speaking? And if the ministers are typically drawn from the legislature, does that not also mean that the government and Parliament are inexorably tied, as the canonical 19th-century chronicler, Walter Bagehot, argued?

Yes, they are linked, notably in the legislative process. But when it comes to where the authority to govern belongs, and who gets to exercise it and why, Bagehot’s description of a fused legislature and executive obscures more than it reveals.

Although ministers are drawn from the legislature by convention, ministerial appointments are made by the Crown. Ministers do not need to be parliamentarians when they are initially appointed, and ministerial offices are held separately from parliamentary ones. Ministers are creatures of the executive who typically sit in the legislature, but when they govern, they do so in their ministerial capacity.

Ministers are appointed on the advice of the prime minister. The prime minister, in turn, is asked to form a government by the Crown upon the assumption that she or he will be able to command the confidence of the Commons. But a loss of confidence does not automatically terminate a prime minister’s tenure. For instance, if an election follows a vote of non-confidence, the prime minister remains in office during the writ. As well, the incumbent prime minister can choose to face the new Commons regardless of the election results, because the legislature does not formally determine who serves as the Crown’s head of government. Prime ministers are only out of office when they resign or are dismissed by the Crown.