Damian Green: The Key Issues are Process, but will be fixed by Politics
You can read my detailed assessment here.
I’d suggest that the crucial aspects here are process issues:
1 - The violation of Commons privilege.
2 - The facts taken behind the “the police have operational control and have not overstepped the mark” position taken by the Cabinet Ministers. Politically the next question is obvious:
Just who moved the mark to a place where this became possible, Mr Brown?
Practically, the question is different:
How do we move the mark that the police did not go beyond to somewhere more suitable for an advanced democracy?
Realistically, that is only going to happen in 2 scenarios, either a Tory majority, or a hung Parliament as a condition of Lib Dem cooperation with a minority administration.
To move this agenda forwards, the positive outcome I’m looking for is for Mr Cameron to be radicalised on the need to turn back the long list of illiberal measures we have seen since 1997.
Those who are driven by partisan Tory-bashing are going to have to decide whether they think that Labour winning the next election is actually going to deliver a reform of the restrictions that have been placed on the freedom of our citizens, and reverse the nebulous and ill-defined laws that have given our police unfocussed, but draconian, powers.
What is the likelihood of Labour reversing the New Labour laws? I don’t see much hope even with a minority Labour administration - due largely to the damage done to the party’s internal democratic processes in the mid-1990s to protect “The Project”. A whole dominant generation of leaders within the party seem to be firmly behind this programme, so I see no prospect of change.
If you are a Labour supporter and believe in rolling back the New Labour laws, then I think you are going to have to hope for a minority Tory administration mitigated by a Liberal Democrat partnership. Get used to it.
Perhaps the important question is whether the Lib Dems will be able to bring themselves to do it, given their traditional antipathy to all things Conservative.
Categories: All WW, Comment, Labour, LibDem, Political Blogging, Politics, Tory
Er, no.
Parliamentary Privilege means you can’t be done for slander for what you say in the House of Commons and can’t be arrested for a civil offence on the Parliamentary estate.
Another part of the issue is that politicians of all sides constantly use tactics that give them a slightly larger slice of a slightly smaller pie - short-term political gain at the cost of damage to the quality of democracy.
Given that there is not, so far as I can tell, sufficient evidence to make a judgment, I can’t help but feel that this is all a little premature unless you want MPs to have an absolute freedom from arrest.
xD.
Dave Cole´s last blog post..Barack H. Obama revisited
Hmmm. Let’s see how it goes. I think there’s perhaps a concept that I might call “customary” privilege, around the hard core of defined privilege, and that the customary privilege has come into conflict with the harder edge to policing that has developed.
I’d certainly agree that the whole area could do with a careful look. Personally I hope that the House asserts itself and perhaps elaborates its own rights.
I think the political point about where Labour is going is quite important, however.
I’ll be posting some legal analysis from lawyers this morning, which a lot of people seem to have missed.
You are welcome to post a reply.
Matt