To out line and define the advantages and disadvantage of refernda in the united kingdom it is necessary to out line the true meaning of an refendum. An referendum is a vote taken my the majority on a slected question. The question is normaly worded a such to be for or against an approved action. Once the vote is cast the answer for or against that gains the highest quantity of votes is that which is taken to be the majority prefered decision. In the united kingdom these referendums are take to be as a guidence for action to be taken but in other countries such as the united sates the ferrendum is set into law once it has been voted on. .
Referendums are seen by the majority as a method of resolving a dibate or problem that can not be decided up with in the goverment or that is causing a divide with in the general population. There has only ever been one referendum with in the united kingdom that was in 1975 to vote on the EC. Refernedums are relitavly uncomon in the Uk has there is a tendency for people to allow the goverment of the day to make the decisions that they view best for them. .
Therefore the first advantage of referendums has to be that of a method of attempting to solving political topical stailmates. A disadvantage of this though is the fact that it does not always resolve political unrest as the results may be extreamly close or the out come represents a disproportionate quatity on the population. This was the case in 1997 were only around one fourth of the electrate turned out to vote but because there was over 50% infavor of an essembley it was passed as law. .
There are many different disadvatages to referenda thought. Referndums do not normly proportional represent the total population involved in the projected topic. This means that a topic can be voted in as law even if only a very small proportion of the population turns out to vote. Thus it can lead to minorities gaining political achivments even if most people have not voted.