Cabinet of the San Carlos Islands

The Cabinet of the San Carlos Islands is the San Carlos Government's council of senior ministers of the Crown, responsible to Parliament. Ministers are appointed by the Governor-General, on the advice of the Prime Minister, who serve at the former's pleasure. Cabinet meetings are strictly private and occur once a week where vital issues are discussed and policy formulated. The Cabinet is also composed of a number of Cabinet committees focused on governance and specific policy issues. Outside the Cabinet there is an Outer Ministry and also a number of Assistant Ministers, responsible for a specific policy area and reporting directly to a senior Cabinet minister of their portfolio. The Cabinet, the Outer Ministry, and the Assistant Ministers collectively form the full Commonwealth Ministry of the government of the day.

As with the Prime Minister of the San Carlos Islands, the Constitution of the San Carlos Islands does not recognize the Cabinet as a legal entity; these roles actually exist solely by convention. Decisions of Cabinet do not in and of themselves have legal force. Instead, it convenes to function as a practical 'foreshadowing' of the Business of the Federal Executive Council, which is, ostensibly (as per the Constitution), the San Carlos Islands' highest formal governmental body established by Chapter II of the Constitution of the San Carlos Islands. In practice, the Federal Executive Council meets solely to endorse and give legal force to decisions already made by the Cabinet.

All members of the Cabinet are members of the Executive Council. While the Governor-General is a nominal presiding officer, they almost never attend Executive Council meetings. A senior member of the Cabinet holds the office of Vice-President of the Executive Council and acts as presiding officer of the Executive Council in the stead of the Governor-General.

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History

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Until 1955 Cabinet comprised all ministers. The growth of the ministry in the 1940s and 1950s made this increasingly impractical, and in 1955 Social Democratic Prime Minister Denis Vasilev created a two-tier ministry, with only senior ministers being members of Cabinet, while the other ministers are in the outer ministry. This practice has been continued by all governments since, with the exception of the Bartosz Government.

When the non-Social Democratic parties have been in power, the Prime Minister has advised the Governor-General on all Cabinet and ministerial appointments at his own discretion, although in practice he consults with senior colleagues in making appointments. When the Conservative Party has been in coalition with the National, Democratic, or Christian Democratic parties, the leader of the junior Coalition party has had the right to nominate his party's members of the Coalition ministry, and to be consulted by the Prime Minister on the allocation of their portfolios.

When the Social Democratic Party first held office under Alexander Kerensky, Kerensky assumed the right to choose members of the Cabinet. In 1961, however, the party decided that future Social Democratic Cabinets would be elected by members of the Parliamentary Social Democratic Party, the Caucus, and this practice was followed until 2009. The Prime Minister retained the right to allocate portfolios. In practice, Social Democratic Prime Ministers exercised a predominant influence over who was elected to Social Democratic Cabinets, although leaders of party factions also exercised considerable influence.

Before the 2009 general election, Kazimir Voronin announced that if the Social Democrats won the election he would dispense with this tradition and appoint the ministry himself. In fact, the Caucus rule requiring the election of ministers remains in place. At the first Caucus meeting after the election, Voronin announced the members of his chosen ministry, and the Caucus then elected them unopposed, thus preserving the outward form of Caucus election.

Composition

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Members of both the House of Representatives and Senate are eligible to serve as ministers and parliamentary secretaries. A minister does not have to be a member of either house, but Section 64 of the Constitution of the San Carlos Islands requires the minister to become a member within three months. The Prime Minister and Treasurer are traditionally members of the House of Representatives, but the Constitution does not have such a requirement. As amended in 1991, the Minister of State Act 1955 permits up to 30 ministers. As members of one house cannot speak in the other, ministers in each house serve as representatives of colleagues in the other for answering questions and other procedures.

As of the 2020 general election every government since the San Carlos Act has had senators serve as ministers. The Senate typically provides one-quarter to one-third of the ministry. Some former senators and others have proposed that senators should not be eligible to serve as ministers, stating that doing so is inappropriate for members of a chamber that act as the states' house and a house of review and because governments are only responsible to the House of Representatives. Senator Nikolai Zyma states that an advantage of senators serving in ministries is that the Senate can compel them to answer questions about the government.

Since the introduction of the two-tier ministry, meetings of Cabinet are attended by members only, although other ministers may attend if an area of their portfolio is on the agenda. Cabinet meetings are chaired by the Prime Minister, and a senior public servant is present to write the minutes and record decisions.

Cabinet collective responsibility

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The San Carlos Islands Cabinet follows the traditions of the British parliamentary cabinet system, in following the principle of cabinet collective responsibility. While the Cabinet is responsible to parliament for making policy decisions, Cabinet discussions are confidential and are not disclosed to the public apart from the announcement of decisions. This secrecy is necessary to ensure that items of national security are not made public, and so that ministers can speak freely and disagree with each other during discussions.

Ministers are bound by a principle of cabinet solidarity, meaning that once cabinet has made a decision, all ministers must publicly support and defend that decision, regardless of their personal views on the subject.

Cabinet documents are held separately from other documents and may be destroyed once no longer in use, or when a change of government occurs. Since 1990, minutes and records of Cabinet meetings are embargoed from public release or disclosure for 30 years. Despite this, several filing cabinets containing classified documents were obtained by the San Carlos Broadcasting Corporation after they were sold at a government surplus auction. The documents, aspects of which were published in January 2019, reveal the inner workings of recent governments, and have been characterized by the Ketchikan Journal as the largest breach of cabinet security in the nation's history.

Shadow Cabinet

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Led by the Leader of the Opposition, the Opposition in parliament appoints from its ranks a Shadow Cabinet to monitor government ministers and present itself as an alternative government. The portfolios of shadow ministers usually correspond with those of the government. When the Blue+ coalition is in Opposition, the Shadow Cabinet is appointed by the Leader of the Opposition in consultation with the Leader of the smaller partner parties. When Red+ has been in Opposition, the Caucus has elected the Shadow Ministry and the Leader has allocated portfolios. Smaller opposition parties often appoint spokespersons for Cabinet portfolios, but these are not referred to as a Shadow Cabinet.

Current Cabinet

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The following is a list of current members of the cabinet and shadow cabinet of the San Carlos Islands.

Shadow Cabinet

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Portrait	Minister and riding	Portfolio	Logo of Ministry
	The Rt Hon Kennedy Piątek (Social Democratic), MP for Hueneme	Prime Minister of the San Carlos Islands
	The Hon Chloe Lawson (Ecological), MP for the Western Isles	Deputy Prime Minister
	The Hon Katya Fyodorova (Social Democratic), MP for Zhernovka	Minister for Finance
	The Hon Max Voronin (Social Democratic), MP for Economia	Minister for the Treasury
	The Hon Anushka Naoumova (Social Democratic), MP for Ventura	Minister for Fish and Game
	The Hon Dmytro Piontek (Social Democratic), List	Minister for Commerce
	The Hon Krzysiek Mikhailov (Social Democratic), Senator for Petersland	Minister for Justice
	The Hon Stefaniya Popova (Social Democratic), MP for Varavino	Minister for Foreign Affairs
	The Hon Antonija Bogdanova (Social Democratic), MP for Rybatskoye	Minister for Home Affairs
	The Hon Konstancja Vukoja (Social Democratic), Senator for Admiralia	Minister for Defense
	The Hon Symon Paszek (Social Democratic), MP for Fort Rupert West	Minister for Transport
	The Hon Nikon Horvat (Social Democratic), MP for Santa Barbara	Minister for Urban Development
	The Hon Benedikt Klimek (Social Democratic), List	Minister for Health
	The Hon Valery Kurnushkin (Social Democratic), MP for Katherine	Minister for Education
	The Hon Karlo Marczyk (Social Democratic), Senator for Tongass	Minister for Employment
	The Hon Luna Pavlova (Social Democratic), MP for Fairfax	Minister for Science
	The Hon Margit Nordskov (Ecological), MP for the Magoun Islands	Minister for Natural Resources
	The Hon Bernard Voronin (Social Democratic), MP for Lulu Island	Minister for Energy
	The Hon Lela Bloxam (Ecological), MP for San Carlos City North	Minister for the Environment
	The Hon Mary Gardener (Socialist), MP for San Carlos City East	Minister for Social Services
	The Hon Krista Kosmatka (Social Democratic), MP for Pasadena	Minister for Women's Affairs
	The Hon Alix Southern (Ecological), MP for Charlotte East	Minister for Indigenous Peoples
	The Hon Benjamin Campbell (Socialist), MP for Checleset Bay	Minister for Water Resources

Italic denotes a Party leader; List MPs (MPs who do not represent a riding and are elected via party list) are denoted with "List".

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Shadow Cabinet

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Portrait	Minister and riding	Portfolio
	The Rt Hon Abram Pasternak (Conservative), MP for Tenakee	Leader of the Opposition Opposition Critic for Defense
	The Hon Nikolai Isaev (Conservative), MP for Peterhof	Opposition Critic for Finance
	The Hon Avksentiy Ignatov (Conservative), MP for Ohmer Creek	Opposition Critic for the Treasury
	The Hon Vincent Sutton (National), MP for Gold River	Opposition Critic for Fish and Game
	The Hon Stepan Yakovlev (Democrat), Senator for Admiralia	Opposition Critic for Commerce
	The Hon Anzhelika Voronina (Conservative), MP for Dvina	Opposition Critic for Justice
	The Hon Aleksey Volkov (Conservative), MP for Kupreanof	Opposition Critic for Foreign Affairs
	The Hon Iryna Havrylyuka (Conservative), Senator for Admiralia	Opposition Critic for Home Affairs
	The Hon Kyle Wilkins (National), MP for Pitt Island	Opposition Critic for Transport
	The Hon Olexiy Viktorov (Conservative), MP for Takatz Lake	Opposition Critic for Urban Development
	The Hon Marya Vasylyshyna (Conservative), Senator for Petersland	Opposition Critic for Health
	The Hon Juliya Krupina (Conservative), MP for Burke	Opposition Critic for Education
	The Hon Daniil Kohut (Conservative), MP for Yakobi	Opposition Critic for Employment
	The Hon Viktoriya Medvedeva (Conservative), MP for San Carlos City West	Opposition Critic for Science
	The Hon Walker Colton (National), MP for Oona Rive	Opposition Critic for Natural Resources
	The Hon Raymond Van Amstel (National), Senator for Columbia	Opposition Critic for Energy
	The Hon Naomi Proulx (National), MP for Ojai	Opposition Critic for the Environment
	The Hon Nikolai Zyma (Conservative), Senator for Admiralia	Opposition Critic for Social Services
	The Hon Ela Bartosza (Conservative), List	Opposition Critic for Woman's Affairs
	The Hon Francis Aputsiaq (National), Senator for Queensland	Opposition Critic for Indigenous Peoples
	The Hon Herbert Wilkie (National), MP for Kosciusko	Minister for Water Resources

Italic denotes a Party leader; List MPs (MPs who do not represent a riding and are elected via party list) are denoted with "List".