The Establishment is dead

The Establishment is dead. But something worse has replaced it

Peter Oborne

15 September 2007

It has been replaced by a narrow, self-serving governing elite

This fundamentally heterogeneous and decentralised structure of British government has since come under brutal attack from the Political Class. For instance, the Political Class is deeply hostile to the rule of law. It constantly strives to undermine the judiciary, instinctively preferring to govern through executive fiat, repeatedly showing anger when the judges thwart illegal decisions made by ministers. Likewise the traditional civil service insistence on the necessity of due process, note-taking and the importance of precedent fills the Political Class with rage. In general the Political Class is infused by an unbending hostility to all centres of power or values which it cannot control or manipulate.

Members of the Political Class, even when they come from apparently rival parties, have far more in common with each other than they do with voters. They seek to protect one another, help each other out, rather than engage in robust democratic debate. This is why the House of Commons is no longer a cockpit where great conflicts of vision are fought out across the chamber. It has converted instead into a professional group, like the Bar Council or the British Medical Association.

The most important division in Britain is no longer the Tory versus Labour demarcation that marked out the battle zone in politics for the bulk of the 20th century. The real division is between a narrow, self-serving and increasingly corrupt governing elite and the mass of ordinary voters. The distinction between those in and out of ministerial office has become blurred, and general elections have become public stunts, whose primary purpose is an ostentatious affirmation of Political Class hegemony.

Peter Oborne is a contributing editor of The Spectator. His book The Triumph of the Political Class is published by Simon & Schuster on 17 September.