Christopher Chope: My fetish for Parliamentary procedure

All hell broke loose after I prevented several Private Members’ Bills receiving approval at Second Reading ‘on the nod’.  Despite the campaigner behind one of those Bills, Gina Martin, accepting the principled reasons for my objections, many on social media chose to believe otherwise.  Fortunately by Monday the Government had agreed that there should be a Government Bill in Government time to consider the legislation to ban the offensive and unacceptable practice of ‘upskirting’ which has been banned in Scotland since 2009.  My intervention has ensured that the legislation will have proper scrutiny and a much speedier passage to enactment.  This is because unless the Government was intent on breaking the first come, first served convention, the Voyeurism Bill would have been in a queue behind many other balloted Private Members’ Bills already debated and approved at Second Reading.

It is well known that a lie can circle the world before truth can put its boots on.  But the frenzy over ‘upskirting’ is my first personal experience of such a phenomenon.  Despite setting the record straight in letters which were published on Monday in ‘The Daily Telegraph’ and ‘The Times’ and giving a one hour interview to my local paper, ‘The Daily Echo’, many people still prefer to believe the false assumption at the heart of the hostile reaction.  It is a source of comfort, however, to have received large numbers of emails and letters supporting what one described as ‘my fetish for Parliamentary procedure’.

At the time of writing, I have just cut down another line of underwear (soon to be sold for charity) which was hanging across the entrance to my constituency Parliamentary office.  As I do so I reflect upon how although the last few days have been rather torrid, unjust criticism and personal ridicule are a price worth paying for doing what one believes to be right.  Next weekend, when monitoring the Turkish Presidential Election, I shall be reminded how fortunate I am to be able to continue to serve in a truly democratic Parliament where the legislature and the executive are still separate.