government minister
5
3.7
- noun
- /ˈɡʌvərnmənt ˈmɪnɪstər/
- UK
:
ministro
- As a government minister, she is responsible for overseeing the health department.
- leaders and government ministers
Immediately after the incident, there was a government minister from UK sent me, phone me up and send me a letter.
- Immediately after the incident, there was a government minister from UK sent me, phone me up and send me a letter.
Examples
-
His defense was that his ambitions had been encouraged by government ministers, themselves anxious to have a new media owner on their side.
Academic text (2000) -
Even the Party General Secretary, the President, the Prime Minister, and almost all of the government ministers are also subject to the election, and their election totals are published publicly.
Academic text (2014) -
Currently, approximately 30% of national government ministers are women.
Academic text (2007) -
One government minister recalled a moment from his school days:
Academic text (2006) -
Upstairs from us is an apartment that belongs to a government minister.
Fiction book (1998) -
All governments or central bankers or government ministers have to do is to read history and they know it's going to happen again.
-
I'm a government minister and I don't have control of my own blinds.
-
The king's explicit right to dismiss government ministers, inserted in previous constitutions but not in the draft text of the new version, was also restored.
Academic text (2012) -
And this was none other than the distinguished barrister and former government minister Lord Hallam, whose acquaintance he had made, as he had so many others, at the gaming table.
-
When Tata announced last week that it planned to sell or close down this loss-making operation, government ministers knew it would mean the disappearance of thousands of jobs and catastrophe for a town like Port Talbot, in Wales, that depends almost entirely on its steel plant.
Academic text (2016)
Synonyms
862
3.0
A senior government official who leads a department
572
5.1
A person who manages a government department or public service
411
4.1
A senior government official who leads a major department
118
3.2
A person elected or appointed to carry out government work
20
3.0
A person who leads a department in a company or school
12
5.0
A senior government official who is part of the cabinet and leads a government department
How Senior
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly and transparently derivable from combining 'government' (the body exercising state authority) with 'minister' (a high-ranking official): a minister who is part of the government. The compositional relationship is literal and matches patterns found across many languages, so a B1 learner who knows both words will understand the phrase.
Etymology
Government minister comes from a time when a minister meant a servant or helper to a ruler, so imagine a trusted helper standing close to the leader and doing important tasks. That's why a government minister now means a high official 'in charge' of a department or a special job.