Roy Hattersley has it right. The Esther Rantzen phenomenon is the culmination of the definition of an MP as an amateur social worker and a single-handed Citizen’s Advice Bureau. Political opinions do not enter into it.
The roots of this are in the evisceration of local government. And it is itself the root of the expenses scandal. When did someone decide that an MP’s job was so bi-located that an MP needed two homes? For that matter, when did anyone stop noticing that they had a Palace in which to live when they were in London, and thus had no need of any other accommodation there?
We send MPs to Westminster to be parliamentarians. Expecting them to spend anything up to three or four days of the week back home even when Parliament is in session leads to the wholesale non-scrutiny of legislation, the demand for another house, and the practice of taking 82 days off in the summer. To attend to constituency business. Of course…
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Yes but there is no real difference between high profile "celeb" independants and non-celeb independents.
ReplyDeleteBritain is a "Party" democracy and loathe or like Party Politicians, the "professional POLTICS" is much better than amateur.
Would that an MP were anything nearly as useful as 'an amateur social worker and a single-handed Citizen’s Advice Bureau'!
ReplyDeleteIn reality the only qualification one needs to be an MP nowadays is to be good at lying. The real roots of this tendency are in the relentless expansion of the Establishment, to such an extent that only the most professionally adept manipulators of the truth (barristers, journalists and TV personalities) can have any hope of maintaining the illusion that they are the ones in charge rather than the civil servants (who are no longer servants, let alone civil).
I would say that it's this tendency that Esther Rantzen typifies. She's a TV-personality rather than a real person, so she's most of the way there already. The difference between TV-stars and politicians though is that TV-stars are only fake (or they only have to be fake) when they're on TV. Politicians are politicians all the time.
The best possible example of this tendency though is of course David Cameron. As a former PR man he is the professional politician par excellence. The soundbite that he is the "heir to Blair" is actually quite misleading. Blair himself, as a failed barrister, was really the forerunner of Cameron. Cameron will be the final, finished product. For pure mastery of the dark arts of spin and presentation even the Right Hon Mr Peter Mandelson, as next Leader of the Opposition, will be unable to touch him.
But we need new parties, John. That means getting in the sorts of people whpo eventually coalesced into the old ones.
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