first minister

first minister noun: the principal minister of a ruler or state.

Noun (1)

first minister (plural first ministers)

The principal minister of a ruler or state.
- The king, knowing that he had an alternative administration in waiting, accepted the first minister's wish.2016, Peter Ackroyd, Revolution, Pan Macmillan, published 2017, page 339
(Canada, often, plural) The prime minister or a provincial or territorial premier.
(UK) A leader of a devolved government such as Scotland, Wales, or Northern Ireland.
- The Welsh first minister has defended his decision to travel to Qatar for the World Cup, saying he feels that the citizens of Wales want their country’s leader there despite concerns about human rights and working conditions.2022 November 20, Steven Morris, “Welsh first minister defends trip to World Cup in Qatar”, in The Guardian
- Yousaf is almost certain to be confirmed as Scotland’s next first minister in a nominal vote at Holyrood on Tuesday but now has to bridge those divides by bringing the SNP’s warring wings together.2023 March 27, Severin Carrell, Libby Brooks, “Humza Yousaf elected leader of Scottish National party”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

First Minister (plural First Ministers)

What does first minister mean?: First minister means the principal minister of a ruler or state.
What part of speech is first minister?: First minister is a noun.
What is the plural of first minister?: The plural of first minister is first ministers.

Adapted from Wiktionary: first minister (page history and authors); First Minister (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “first minister.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/first_minister. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.