Reform in Commons
The expenses scandal exposed some pretty questionable behavior by MPs who claimed public money for private purposes. Several resigned and others have become lame ducks.
Now, Denis MacShane [right], who is a Labour MP for Rotherham, laments changes he foresees in an op-ed piece for The Guardian (UK). His argument is implied in this piece and in the UK, political watchers probably know more clearly what he's describing. But for those of us far away and outside London's equivalent of D.C.'s "beltway," MacShane's points are not clear. I think he's arguing that without expense allowances and with too much party control, MPs in the future will have to be rich party hacks.The Commons will be robbed of independence and authority
It was Trollope who wrote that to have the initials MP after one's name was the noblest ambition an Englishman could seek.
No longer. After centuries in which a small wood-lined room, not much bigger than a tennis court, allowed a few hundred fellow citizens to speak their minds freely, ferociously or fawningly, as they desired or the occasion required, it is time to say farewell to the MP as a unique British institution.
The roll call of those who are leaving reduces the independence and authority of the Commons in a way not seen for decades. Labour is losing... two of the most independent backbenchers the Commons has ever known...
[One of them] says he is quitting because the seven-day weeks MPs put in, and the requirement from constituents that MPs now reply instantly by email to every inquiry 52 weeks a year, is exhausting...
The demand that all MPs should enter the Commons only after years of experience in other jobs has a pleasing populist air to it. Yet this principle would have meant farewell to Pitt, Churchill, Gladstone, or more recently Tony Benn or Charles Kennedy, or any number of MPs who were elected as young men and became effective precisely because they engaged in the profession of politics at an early age. Should William Hague, elected in his 20s, now go and do work experience? Does David Cameron's few years spinning for Carlton TV make him a better Tory leader?...
Tory wannabe candidates are now going through a five-hour interview as if they were applying to join the civil service. The odds and sods, the cranks and campaigners, the youthful Hagues and Blairs, will all be excluded.
Welcome to the new House of Commons, courtesy of... a British public going through one of its periodic fits of morality. In signing our allowance claim forms, did MPs realise we were signing the death warrant of the idea of independent professional political representative democracy? We have only ourselves to blame, but the consequences for democracy may be dire.
Labels: change, legislature, politics, UK
posted by Ken Wedding @ 11:51 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home