Invincible Summer |||

Mourning parliamentary democracy

“Graham Allen MP”, writes Anthony Barnett at OurKingdom, “has tried harder, with more patience and less thanks, to get Labour to embrace genuine democratic reform than perhaps any other member of his Party, not to speak of his fellow MPs. Now, as yet another Committee reports on how the Commons could be reformed, ePolitix has just published his stark, bitter reflection, asking whether we need (or deserve) a parliament at all.”

Parliament is sick and decaying – and neither the government nor the media want it to recover.

Government is the unelected incubus which needs parliament only in order to cloak itself in its electoral legitimacy. Policy innovations, holding to account, balancing government power, securing value for money all these functions are no longer in the legislature’s remit, and haven’t been for many decades.

Although the media have joined the clamour for a clean-up, the last thing they want is for a clean-up to succeed.

A weak, despised parliament suits them only too well. They can win readers and audiences with eye-catching stories of scandals over expenses.

Read the full article.

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