Quote Originally Posted by Xjy View Post
Elections in the UK were for a parliamentary period of seven years before 2002. If elections took place before this it was because the calling of an election was at the discretion of the government, and the government saw to it that it called an election at a time advantageous to itself. And these elections were lightning affairs - very short campaigns. This led to "snap elections" called at very short notice.
The government still had discretion to call elections when it liked after 2002. But in November last year this discretion was ended with the introduction of Fixed-Term Parliaments.
That's not the best bit. The best bit is that any future government (with a Commons majority) could simply repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act and then trigger a general election anyway, so it's literally not worth the paper it's written on.

Though I have to say, short election campaigns are one of the few things I do like about the British electoral system.