A parliamentary vote is an act of parliament in which members of a legislature, usually of the lower house (House of Commons in the UK), are asked to vote on a motion that is proposed by a member or group of Members. Those voting in favour move to the right of the Presiding Officer and those opposing do so to the left, and the name and number of those in favor or against are recorded by the Presiding Officer.
A deciding vote accorded by the Speaker (or, in committee, the chair) in the event of a deadlock. The Speaker or chair may vote only to avoid an impasse; traditionally he votes so as to maintain the status quo.
The executive function of a parliamentary system is vested in a prime minister and department ministers selected by a political party or coalition of parties that make up the majority of the parliament’s membership. There is also often a ceremonial head of state — either a hereditary monarch in countries with constitutional monarchies such as Great Britain, Japan and Norway or an elected president or chancellor in the democratic constitutional republics of Germany, Italy and Spain.
In most parliamentary systems, the supreme law of the land is written in an constitution. However, some parliamentary democracies have weak or nonexistent checks on the legislative power of their parliaments; in those, new laws are not automatically superior to existing ones and they cannot be overturned by judicial review, as is the case in most constitutional monarchies.