Good grief. If I lived in, say, Luton South perhaps the only thing that could persuade me to vote for Margaret Moran would be the appalling thought of replacing her with, of all people, Esther Rantzen. What next, Janet Street-Porter for parliament?
Like Bagehot I think this one of most entertaining – and revealing – reactions to the revelations of the Great Expenses Swindle of 2009: The latest batch of expenses details revealed by the Telegraph included the fact that Peterborough MP Stewart Jackson had made a claim of £304.10 for the upkeep of a swimming pool. In response he said: “The pool came with the house and I needed to know how to run it. Once I was shown that one time, there were no more claims. I take care of the pool myself. I believe this represents ‘value for money’ for the taxpayer.” Priceless, if you know what I mean.
The problem with being a newspaper columnist is that you have to keep finding new stuff to say. New is more important than better, you understand. So when everyone is outraged (and, hell, justifiably so for once!) by the spectacle of MPs’ outrageous abuse of the spirit, and often the letter, of their expense arrangements then, sure as eggs is eggs, you know some columnist is going to take the contrary view and argue that it’s all a lot of fuss over not very much. David Aaronovitch has nobly decided that this is his role this week, inviting us to cool our passions and admire his sagacity as he scolds
Like any sensible person I’ve been thoroughly amused and appalled by the scandal of MPs expenses. Appalled because the extent of MPs’ avarice is sufficient to shock even an iron-souled cynic; amused because watching MPs try to justify their gluttonous appetite for taxpayer-funded freebies affords a certain pleasure that one might consider vindictive if only it weren’t so entirely merited. This isn’t a tragedy, it’s a stinking farce. The dreary pretense – duly repeated by every sticky-fingered parliamentarian – that it is all ok because “no rules were broken” could hardly be more priceless. Nor could it do more to underline the essential fact that these people are fools who
The shocking thing about the government’s defeat this afternoon is that it can be described as a shock at all. And parliamentarians wonder why they are viewed with, to put it mildly, disdain? Anyone with an ounce of commonsense can see that it is grotesque to tell the Gurkhas that they may fight in the British army but they cannot live in Britain. And yet 246 MPs duly blundered through the government lobby solely so they could be good little soldiers themselves and try and spare their masters some much-deserved embarrassment. Then again, it’s a testament to the reduced expectations people have of parliament that it actually is a surprise
Commenting on this post about the Damian McBride Affair, Shippers makes an excellent point: things are just as bad, if not worse, on the other side of the Atlantic. Consider this example, culled from Politico’s daily Playbook: The WashPost’s First Dog exclusive – which the WP says the First Lady’s office offered in March to stave off a premature story about the White House vegetable garden, which had been promised as an exclusive to The New York Times (we’re not making this up) – is rained on by weekend Web leaks. But the WP has first word that the adorable black Portuguese water dog, a gift from Senator and Mrs.
If it weren’t such fun despising Derek Draper one might have to pity the poor man. James has already highlighted one part of his latest post, but here’s another noteworthy, if sadly delusional, passage: Maybe this affair will encourage the whole blogosphere, right and left, to commit to a new start, where offensiveness and personal attacks are avoided and debate is elevated not dragged down into the gutter? Maybe this can be a turning point at which we all redouble our efforts to tap into the internet´s positive potential rather than allowing its more peurile aspects to come to the fore? But that won´t happen without many many more people
The first thing to say about the downfall of Damian McBride is, of course, how entertaining it is. Gordon Brown’s machine has deserved this kind of comeuppance for years. These are, and always have been, thoroughly disreputable people and, while there are plenty of people in the Labour party who might be wondering today why they’ve tolerated the McBrides of this world for so long, the questions don’t end there. After all, McBride and his ilk depend upon the connivance of the press to operate effectively. There’s something amusing too about seeing the press do its finest Captain Renault impression, declaring itself Shocked! that this is the way that Downing
Tim Montgomerie suggests David Cameron needs to do a little more to produce a proper, comprehensive policy on MPs expenses. That’s probably true. As we all know, any talk of reform at Westminster unnerves parliamentarians from all parties since, as we all know, no-one has clean hands in this affair. They’ve all been fiddling the system – legally! – for years, unaware that as far as the public’s concerned the legality of the system is pretty much irrelevant. MPs at Westminster might often envy their cousins across the pond – members of the House of Representatives enjoy a “Representational Allowance” of up to $1.6m for staff, office and franking costs
A lot of us have been wondering what Westminster might be like under the Tories. What, for instance, would the parliamentary press lobby look like under a Cameron government? A return to deference, perhaps. Would the gentlemen and the ladies of the press take their information dutifully from the PM’s spokesman or woman (who would presumably be called a spokesman) and put it straight in the paper? We now have an indication from the behaviour at Eric Pickles’s bash (quite literally) last night that we may see a different kind of throwback to the days of boozing and brawling that seemed a distant memory.
Exhibit A: From the Daily Mail, November 8th 2008. Man caught in £30,000 benefit fraud: After the case, employment and welfare reform minister Tony McNulty said: “Lying to the DWP to get money you aren’t entitled to is a crime. Expecting to get away with it is criminally stupid. This man thought he could live a life of Riley at the taxpayers’ expense. He was wrong. Our investigators caught up with him and now he’ll face the penalty for his crimes.” Exhibit B: On December 4th 2008 the BBC reveals how councils are using “voice recognition lie detectors” to crack down on benefit fraud: DWP Minister of State Tony McNulty
A couple of revealing entries from Chris Mullin’s diaries that reveal the Prime Minister to be some ungodly (and unhealthy) combination of Uriah Heep and Lyndon Baines Johnson: Wednesday July 4th, 2001: Later, sitting on the terrace, I was joined by a member of the Blair inner circle*. Conversation soon turned to Gordon. I mentioned that following my departure from government, I had received a handwritten letter saying how much he had enjoyed working with me. It seems that every ex-Minister has received an identical letter. All the new Members have received letters too. He must have been up half the night writing them. No stone is left unturned. Gordon’s
Tom Harris doesn’t much care for the Liberal Democrats: Having seen the damage done to the Labour Party through its association with the Liberals in the Scottish Parliament in previous years, there is, if anything, more hostility among MPs to the idea of power sharing than ever. On the other hand, if the Liberal Party want to sign up to the implementation of Labour’s manifesto in the aftermath of the election, fine. So long as they don’t expect either Labour or Tory MPs to agree to a change in the electoral system so that every possible outcome in future would result in the Liberals being in government. Now I’m as
I’ve been reading Chris Mullin’s entertaining diaries and was interested to be reminded that David Cameron was a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee, chaired by Mullin. The Tory leader doesn’t feature often in the diaries, but here’s what Mullin has to say: November 15, 2001: “We have an impressive new Tory on the committee – David Cameron, a young, bright libertarian* who can be relied upon to follow his own instincts rather than the party line.” April 9th, 2002: “More than once, when we reached an impasse, David Cameron came to the rescue. The more I see of him, the more I like. He’s bright, personable and refreshingly
Tom Harris writes: There’s never a whip on Fridays; Friday sittings are reserved either for government-sponsored adjournment debates (when there’s no vote) or for Private Members’ Bills. I always enjoy the very different atmosphere that prevails on Fridays; there’s always a sense of camaraderie which cuts across party divisions, probably because everyone present is volunteering to give up a day in the constituency, often as a favour to a colleague who wants support for a particular measure. [Emphasis added.] He says this like it’s a bad thing. You mean MPs want to spend more time with voters? Why? What’s wrong with these people? Anyway, many of them live in places
Chris Mullin is a good egg and, what’s more has a pawky sense of humour. So I imagine his diaries, serialised in the Mail on Sunday this week, will be entertaining stuff. What strikes one above all – apart from the digs at Gordon Brown’s expense – is the sheer and ghastly tedium of being a government minister. It’s almost enough to make one think they deserve their generous expense accounts and lavish pension. Almost, I say. But then the government reminds you of the extent of its ghastliness. Mullin describes one such event that in some sense seems to ilustrate the gruesome nature of modern politics in general and
Tom Harris’s blog is a very useful creation. Now as it happens I don’t think that parliamentary democracy is under threat because Damien Green was arrested, disgraceful though that arrest certainly was. Nonetheless, there’s little doubt that this government has, time and time again and to an extent that may be as modern as it is largely unprecedented, ignored ancient parliamentary procedures and consistently demonstrated a contempt for “old-fashioned” concepts of liberty and the rule of law. Thus Mr Harris’s latest post is usefully illuminating. He writes: As the right-hand man to Shami Chakrabarti the then Shadow Home Secretary, David “Remember him?” Davis, Dominic [Grieve, the Shadow Home Secretary] did
Time to return to TP O’Connor’s Sketches in the House, his account of the 1893 parliamentary session. Back then, happily, the government could not yet guillotine a bill and so obstructionism – or filibustering – was a legitimate, if infuriating, parliamentary tactic. Much to Mr O’Connor’s irritation… Again I repeat, obstruction is a matter not of intellect, but temperament. Intellectually, I should put Jimmy in a very low place, even in the ranks of the stupid party. Temperamentally he stands very high. A brief description of his methods of obstruction will bring this home. First, it should be said that he is entirely inarticulate and, beyond rough common sense, destitute
My friend James Forsyth asks a daring question: “Will Peter Mandelson end up a National Treasure?” A crazy notion, you may feel, but not an impossible one! Now, of course, in many respects Mandeslon is a dreadful character, but whereas, say, Alastair Campbell is a mere thuggish bully, Mandelson is a subtler operator who enlivens, rather than demeans, the political game. I suspect the lobby is delighted that he’s back. Who could fail to be amused by the manner in which he smoked George Osbourne this summer, as though the Shadow Chancellor was but a kipper? This was Mandelson as his slimy, effortlessly loathsome best. There was something brilliant in
Peter Suderman endorses the idea that life in Washington would be considerably improved if the American president were subjected to some kind of equivalent of Prime Ministers’ Question in the House of Commons. By life, I mean, of course, the quality of political entertainment. And given the dreary nature of most of what happens on the Hill – or in the White House Rose Garden for that matter – one can see why many Americans find the idea appealing. And yet, it’s hard to see quite how any American equivalent would work. PMQs is not, it should be said, quite what many Americans think it is. That is to say,