What is Government?

A government is made up of a body of persons who exercise authoritative direction or control over moral conduct and performs functions as a political unit or organization.

Our government system today is made up of three levels of government, they are municipal, provincial and federal.

A municipal government is the governing body of a town referred to as the town council. The council is made up of seven community elected representatives; a mayor and six councillors with a town clerk hired as staff. The mayor is head of a city or town. The town council provide various services to their community such as water and sewer, garbage collection, street lights, etc. For those services they collect poll tax, property tax and water and sewer tax from the community people. The town council also lobbies to higher levels of government for funding to provide various services for the town. Such services include water and sewer, economic development, etc. Town councils has many governing powers within the town, they include land distribution, permits, town roads and maintenance. Town councils are also responsible to the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs and is governed by the laws in the Municipalities Act.

A provincial government is the government that deals with issues concerning one specific province. Such issues may include education, health care, etc. This government is operated or run by a Premier who is chief of the province. Each province has it's own Premier. Each province is divided into districts. Each district has its own representative or MHA. They are the Members in the House of Assembly in St. John's, Nfld. who presents the concerns of the people of their electoral districts to the Premier.