BRITAIN EXPLORED, Prove d'esame di Lingua Inglese

Scarica BRITAIN EXPLORED e più Prove d'esame in PDF di Lingua Inglese solo su Docsity! GEOGRAPHY OF BRITAIN HIGHLAND AND LOWLAND In Britain there's a really big contrast between "highland" and "lowland". The most precise distinction is geological. North and west Britain is occupied by harder and older rocks than south and east. These older rocks are covered of moorland and the soils are really poor, thin and stony. These areas are also wetter and harder to reach than "lowerland". So, these areas are less populated than the others, except where coal and iron have been discovered. South and east are rarely flat, the soils are generally depper and richer and the climate is drier and better suited to farming. Human settlement is here dense and more evenly spread. POPULATION Britain is densely populated, but the density of population change from area to area. The most populated areas are, of course, the main industrial areas, while there are large areas which contain fewer than 100 people per square kilometer, such as in Wales, Scotland and Northern Island. WEATHER The position of Britain is really strange. This is because in such areas, like Edinburgh it is at the same latitude as Moscow, but its climate is milder because of the Gulf Stream, which brings warm water and air across the Atlantic from the Gulf of Mexico. So, snow only falls occasionally and it doesn't remain for long, except in the Scottish mountains where skiing is possible. Temperature in England and Wales vary from 4°C in January to 16°C in July and August. The wind brings rain from the Atlantic to the hills of the west, so the western parts of Britain are wetter than the eastern ones. London is drier than continental cities and weather may be unpredictable, but it is not particularly wet. LAND USE Over three-quarters of Britain's land is used for farming, but less than 2% of working population work on farms. Farm produce nearly half of food needed by Britain, including all of its milk and eggs and sugar needed. THE UNITED KINGDOM It is a political expression, while "Great Britain is a geographical one. Grat Britain is in fact the biggest group of islands between the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Britain and Ireland together are called the British Isles, which is an expression that originally described the islands themselves. Today the British Isles are shared by 2 separate and independent states. The smaller is the Republic of Ireland, with Dublin as capital. The larger is, of course, the United Kingdom of Great Britain with London as capital and Northern Ireland. The Island of Great Britain contains 3 nations which were separated at earlier stages of history. They are England, Scotland and Wales. The UK is a name which was introduced in 1801 when Great Britain became united with ireland. SCOTLAND AND WALES SCOTLAND: During the history there were constant wars between England and the Kingdom of Scotland from the 11th to the 16th centuries. 1603 => after the death of Queen Elizabeth I of England, James VI of Scotland became also James The Royal Family's money comes from government funds and their own personal wealth, which is considerable. Parliament has had effective control of the monnarch's finances since the seventeenth century. POLITICS THE POLITICAL SYSTEM UK is divided into 650 parliamentary costituencies. Each British citizen over 18 has the vote, although voting is not compulsory. Each costituency is represented by one Member of Parliament in the House of Commons. The winner of elections is the candidate who gets more votes than any other single candidate, no matter the majority. The leader of the party with a majority becomes Prime Minister and forms a Government, which can remain in power for up to 5 years. The second biggest party becomes the official Opposition and its leader forms a "Shadow Cabinet". Since 1945 the Conservatives and Labour have been either the Government or the Opposition. In the 1980s, British politics was dominated by Margaret Thatcher: she was Britain's first woman Prime Minister, leader of the Conservative Party. In 1997 her successor John Major was beaten by Tony Blair of Labour. In 1981 the Social Democrat Party was formed in order to break the dominance of Conservative and Labour. The new party agreed to fight elections in alliance with the small Liberals, forming the Alliance. Their problem was to turn their popular vote into paarliamentary seats. In 1987 both parties agreed to merge to form a new party, the Liberal Democrats. NEW LABOUR In 1994 Tony Blair became leader of the Labour Party, which he called "New Labour". That was because Labour was weakened by divisions in the party. Blair organised his party to run a sophisticated election campaign before the general election in May 1997, when they won with the largest parliamentary majority of any government since 1945. Under the Labour government referendums were run in Scotland, Wales and London and local governments were created in the regions. At the same time some progress was made towards peace in Northern Ireland: the Republic of Ireland agreed to drop the commitment written into its costitution to reclaim the whole of Ireland, and Northern Ireland eventually found itself with a national assembly which included for the first time representatives of Sinn Fein and the Roman Catholic minority. In 1999, membership of the House of Lords was changed radically. Instead of being dominated by hereditary peers, less than 100 remained. THE ELECTION TIMETABLE British government is elected for up to 5 years. The Prime Minister chooses the date of the next General Election, but does not have to wait until the end of the 5 years. About a month before the election the Prime Minister meets a small group of close advisers to discuss about the date to choose. The date is then announced to the Cabinet and the Prime Minister formally asks the Sovereign to dissolve Parliament. Voting takes place on Polling Day and the results are usually announced the same night. The leader of the Party who wins is formally invited by the Sovereign to form a government. THE LAW THE LEGAL SYSTEM British law comes from 2 sources: laws made in Parliament and Common law, which is based on previous judgements and customs. There is no written constitution, so England and Wales have no criminal code or civil code and the interpretation of the law is based on what has happened in the past. The most common type of law court in England and Wales is the magistrates' court. More serious criminal cases then go to the Crown Court, while civil cases are dealt with in County courts. Appeals are heard by higher courts. The highest court of appeal in England and Wales is the House of Lords. The legal system also includes juvenile courts, which deal with offenders under seventeen and coroners' courts, which investigate violent, sudden or unnatural deaths. Solicitors => they make up by far the largest branch of the legal profession in England and Wales. Barristers => defend or prosecute in the higher courts. They represent clients in court. Judges => they preside in more serious cases. Jury => 12 people who are ordinary people chosen at random from the Electoral Register. They listen to the evidence given in court in certain criminal cases and decide whether the defendant is guilty or innocent. Magistrates => they judge cases in the lower courts. Coroners => they have medical or legal training, and inquire into violent or unnatural deaths. Clerks of the court => they look after administrative and legal matters in the courtroom. THE POLICE Each of Britain's police forces is responsible for law enforcement on its own area. In general the local police forces work independently under their own Chief Constables and each force is maintained by a local police authority, except in London, where the Metropolitan Police are responsible to the Home Secretary. Britain has relatively few police and traditionally they are armed only with truncheons except in special circumstances, but recently there has been an increase in the number of special units. BRITAIN AND THE WORLD THE COMMONWEALTH In 1920 the British Empire controlled 1/5 of the world's land surface. Today this Empire has developed into a voluntary association of over 50 indipendent states, including some of the richest countries and some of the poorest. This association began when Britain's older colonies became independent nations. Today Britain has only 14 dependent territories, which rely on Britain for their defence. The Queen is Head of the Commonwealth and she is also Head of State of 18 countries, including Canada and Australia. MULTICULTURAL BRITAIN after the Secon World War, Britain was a prosperous and friendly country for immigrant workers, because all Commonwealth citizens were free to enter the country and look for work. But, since the Immigration Act of 1962, governments of successive years have introduced regulations to restrict the number of immigrants. LOOKING AFTER THE ENVIRONMENT The area of forest and woodland have doubled in the 20th century and now covers over 10% of Britain. The state-run Forestry Commission monitors the health and sustainability of its forests, planting, for example, sqaures of evergreen trees. The voluntary society of national Trust was set up in 1895. It has more than a million and half members and it own more than 200,000 hectares. The North Sea isin danger of becoming poisoned to death. Really a lot of tonnes of industrial waste are dumped into it each year. Now there are landscaped and grassed over to provide a safer and cleaner environment. Great Britain has managed to reduce emissions of greenhouse gas, which contributes to global warming, although it remains responsible for 2% of the man-made carbon diozide in the earth's atmosphere. BRITAIN'S ENERGY Britain is the country which most produce oil, natural gas, coal and nuclear power. Before the 1970s it depended on imports of oil from abroad, but then reserves of oil and gas were discovered in the North Sea and since then it has become independent in the production of them. There are over thirty offshore oilfields from which oil and gas are piped to the mainland. Britain has also large reserves of coal, which played a very important role in the industrial revolution and during the first decades of 20th century, coal industry employed over a million workers. As regards nuclear power, Britain has 14 nuclear power stations in operation and there are also other nuclear installation, such as reprocessing units and research centres. Of course, since the opening of the first nuclear power station there has been much discussion over it. All proposals for new power stations meet with public opposition, and this has increased since the disaster at Chernobyl in the Ukraine in 1986. EDUCATION THE SCHOOL SYSTEM Education is compulsory from the age of 5 to 16. The Department for Education and Skills maintains overall control although local education authorities and head teachers have considerable powers in administration. Until the 1960s most children took an examination at the end of primary school (at the age of 11) and those who passed went to grammar schools while the others went to secondary modern schools. Most parents choose to send their children to free state schools but an increasing number of secondary pupils attend fee-paying independent schools. Many of these are boarding schools, which provide accomodation for pupils during term time. Schools in Britain have 3 terms a year, each with a short half-term break in middle, and longer holidays at Christmas and Easter and in the summer. AFTER 16 Since 1988, most 16-year-olds have taken the general Certificate of Secondary Education or the Scottish Certificate of Education in 5, 10 or 15 subjects. Pupils going on to higher education usually take "A" level examinations in 2 or 3 subjects. These require 2 more years of study after the GCSE. Other pupils may choose vacational subjects such as catering, tourism or building skills. HIGHER EDUCATION In Britain there are more than 100 universities. Undergraduate courses normally take 3 years of full- time study. They lead in most cases to a Bachelor's degree in Arts or Science. Degrees are usually awarded by the institution itself. Universities accept students mainly on the basis of their "A" level results, although they may interview them as well. BUSINESS AND THE ECONOMY PATTERNS OF CHANGE Earlier Britain had a very large manufacturing sector, especially in food, duel and raw materials such as cotton. Today, the manufacturing sector and the small primary sector are employing even fewer people. Britain has a mixed economy, based partly on state ownership but mainly on private enterprise. Government policy throughout the 1980s was to sell state owned industries to private investors, thereby further increasing the size of the private sector. PRIVATISATION Britain's energy and trasport industries were originally run by companies in the private sector. Then, in 1930s and 1940s these services were nationalised. In later years, the state took over other companies that were in economic difficulties in order to protect jobs. From 1979 it was Conservative government policy to return nationalised industries to the private sector. SHARE OWNERSHIP the sale of state-owned industries meant that share ownership increased. State corporations were turned into companies whose shares could be bought and sold on the stock market. In 1979 less than 1/3 of shares in the London stock market were owned by private individuals. The rest were owned by large financial institutions. THE CITY OF LONDON For many years, London has been an important centre for finance. The financial district, known as "The City", occupies one square mile of central London. In contrast to the entertainment district in the West End of London, the City is almost deserted at night. Although the City is central to international finance, it seems increasingly independent of the British domestic economy, because it could be situated anywhere. THE BANK OF LONDON it is Britain's central reserve bank, which controls other British banks, issues banknotes and acts as the government's banker. The City is responsible for about a quarter of international bank lending. THE STOCK EXCHANGE London has a Stock Exchange for dealing in stocks and shares for over 200 years. Since 1973 it has been the single International Stock Exchange for the United Kingdom and the republic of Ireland. In 1986 commissions became negotiable thanks to the opening of the London Stock Exchange to overseas companies. And in same year it became possible for stockbrokers to deal in shares through telephones and pc and this event changes the City and it became known as "Big Bang". LLOYD'S OF LONDON The City is also a major centre for insurance services. Lloyd's of London insures everything from houses to ships through its underwriters, insurance specialists who accept risks on behalf of groups of members who are responsible for meeting any insurance claims. It also publishes detailed information on ships and their movements. Many young people in Britain have a considerable amount of freedom and their family life has become more relaxed and less strict than in the Victorian period. On the other hand there are a lot of social problems associated with young people: some schools have problems with discipline and crime and drug-taking in some areas have reached serious levels. Employment prospects for young people who have no wualifications are not good. The new consumer society means that many children do not do much exercise and the consequence is that many are overweight. THE COST OF LIVING TRENDS British people are spending smaller proportion of their income on food and more on housing and trasport than they had done 20 years earlier. More people drove cars, shopped in big supermarkets and had bank accounts. As the standard of living rose for many people, also spending on leisure activisities such as holidays went up. On the other hans the worst-off were the unemployed, single parents and people living on the state pension. The gap between the rich and the poor continued to become wider during the 1990s. Inflation fell to below 3% but the strong pound caused problems for business and there were disagreements about Britain joining the Eruopean Monetary System. RICH AND POOR income distribution ha snot changed much in the last 30 years but the sources of income have changed considerably. Income from employment has dropped while income from activities such as saving, renting property and investing in the stock market has risen. As regards taxation, the percentage of income which goes in taxes has actually risen since the 1970s. This is because tax theresholds have not risen and also because there has been an increase in indirect taxation, such as in the cost of fuel. HOUSING PATTERNS OF HOUSING Nearly 70% of people in Britain live in their own homes, about 1/5 live in property rented from local councils and 10% live in privately-rented accomodation. The number of houses being built and the number of people who own their own homes have both increased, but the cost of buying somewhere to live varies considerably according to the area. Buying a house is a large financial investment for many people and the majority buy their homes with a morgage loan from a building society or bank. The loan is repaid in monthly instalments over a period of 20 years or more. The standard of housing has improved but while most of the old slum areas in cities have been cleared, many of the large square blocks of flats which replaces them have been criticised as being badly designed and built. Many of them have been pulled down and replaced with low-rise housing. SOMEWHERE TO LIVE In Britain there are many different types of housing. There's the tradizional tatched country cottage, but also flats in the centre of towns. Although Britain is relatively small, the areas where people live vary a lot: there are new towns and inner cities, suburbs, commuter belts and the open countryside. Not only the type of house vary, but also its price. So, the cost of a six-bedroom farmhouse in a other group of diseases. More victims have a history of high colesterol levels, high blood pressure, or smoking. A HEALTHY DIET British diet has changed a lot over the last few years, but not all the changes hae been for the better. For example, now people eat more convenience food and fst food than they used to do. While medical advice suggests that people should have a balanced diet which contains a lot of fruit and vegetables and less sugar and flat. THE DEBATE OVER PUBLIC VS PRIVATE The number of people covered by private medical insurance has increased a lot in the last years. Some NHS staff work in both the public and private sector and evenf if most of the private beds are in private hospitals, there are some private beds in NHS hospitals. The view of Conservative government during 1980s was that people should be diven the freedom of cchoice to pay for their own medical care if they wish, but that NHS must become more efficient and more cost-effective. Opponents said that many people would not be able to pay and that health standards would decline as a result. THE MEDIA NEWSPAPERS In Britain are sold more daily newspaper than in almost any other coyntry. There are 12 national daily newspapers and 11 national Sunday ones. Although newspaper sales have fallen slightly over the past few years, newspapers have an important effect on public opinion. New technology has altered the whole shape of the industry, with changes in the production process and a reduction in the number of employees. One of the beneficial results of computerised production has been improved graphics and photographs. The tendency has been for newspapers to become smaller but to contain more pages. Competition for circulation is intense and newspaper have tried several methods to increase the number of people who read them, including the use of colour and competitions and national bingo games. RADIO BBC radio broadcasts 5 national services to the UK plus regional services in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. There are also 32 BBC Local Radio stations and a number of independent local stations. The first national commercial radio licences were issued in 1992 and many radio stations now also broadcast on the internet. INTERNET By the end of the 1990s the internet and world-wide web had become increasingly important as a contributor to education, entertainment and information. In 2000 over 1/3 of all people in Britain used e-mail in order to comunicate. TELEVISION by the end of the 1990s there were 5 channels on British TV: BBC1 and BBC2 plus 3 independent channels, which get their income from advertisements, while BBC's revenue comes from licence fees, payable by everybody who has a televion. The BBC is incorporated under a Royal Charter, which means it is a state organisatoin but not government controlled. The first television broadcast began in 1936. Channels are generally expected to provide programmes which do not overlap with other channel's productions and there is a Broadcasting Standards Council which is designed to make sure that unsuitable programmes are not shown. WHO WATCHES WHAT? Television viewing is less popular in summer than in winter and more populare with old people than with any other age group. British TV has an international reputation for producing programmes of high wuality such as documentaries, nature programmes, comedies, drama series and quiz shows. VIEWS OF BRITAIN THE OFFICIAL VIEW Britain is a stable and democratical society. Its citizens have freedom of speech and political and religious belief. It is a leading member of the European Union and of the Commonwealth and has a major world role as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. It has been a really important industrial nation since industrial revolution and it is the fourth largest trading nation in the world although small area. It has the largest energy resources of any country in the European Union and is and important world producer of ol, natural gas and coal. British agricolture is famous for its efficiency and productivity and at the same time comprehensive planning and control have reduced air and water pollution. Britain's NHS is famous worlwide and its universities and istitutes of higher education attract really really a lot of foreign students. Britain has for centuries encouraged research and innovation and nobel prizes for science have been won by 68 British citizens. THE TOURIST AUTHORITY VIEW Tourism is already Britain's 5th most important industry and is also the 5th largest tourist industry in the world and it growing rapidly. Britain has a rich and varied cultural heritage and London has an international reputation of its historic sites, museums and famous institutions, but also historical cities such as Oxford, Cambridge and Bath are visited by large numbers of tourists.