Durham Bishop blasts PM on electoral reform

By William Green on Jun 17, 09 12:07 PM

I thought the Government was getting behind electoral reform. At the very least Gordon Brown opened the door to a new system to replace the current first past the post system.

But now a senior clergyman has had a pop. The Bishop of Durham has attacked Gordon Brown's push for constitutional reform as a "desperate attempt to flail around in the water as the sharks close in".

In a stinging attack, he said the country needed constitutional reform but the Government was "not the team to do it" because its plans would appear to be a "diversionary tactic".

His comments came after the Prime Minister opened the door to a far-reaching overhaul of how Parliament works in response to the expenses scandal amid bitter rows inside the Labour party.

Speaking in the Lords, the senior clergyman said: "If even a Government in happier times, with no whiff of scandal or internal division, were suddenly to propose such a package, we would be startled.

"How much more when this is bound to appear as a diversionary tactic, a displacement activity, a desperate attempt to flail around in the water as the sharks close in?"

He added: "We need constitutional reform, but this is not the way to go about it, and this Government are not the team to do it.

"If we are to have serious change, it must command massive assent across the country, and the Government are now incapable of achieving that."

The Bishop of Durham said more time was needed to discuss such massive changes with most people only just becoming aware of the depth of the constitutional problem.

Insisting he was even-handed, he regarded with "equal suspicion" the call for an immediate election or for Proportional Representation (PR) as failing to address the breakdown of trust in Parliament or problem constitution.

"They both assume that if we only voted again, or voted differently, the sun would come out from behind the cloud and everyone in the country would smile again.

"No - the people I meet day by day in the North East of England are not eager for an election, and they are not fussed about proportional representation.

"They want representatives they can trust who will address their real questions and interests. They do not think that another vote, of whatever shape, will achieve that," said the Bishop.

Warning against scrapping the unelected Lords, he said the belief only MPs had legitimacy rang "extremely" hollow when some of them brought the system into disrepute.

The Bishop attacked "career" politicians compared to widely experienced specialists in the Lords, while stressing the need for urgent reform of the expenses system.

Failing politicians should be put on television to decide whether they should be fired, the Bishop of Durham has suggested.

He said: "Greek and Roman democracy used sometimes to put their rulers on trial, sometimes even during, but certainly after, their term of office.

"The Athenians invented in the fifth century BC an interesting system called ostracism, where you could have a popular vote to banish somebody for 10 years."

Referring to Apprentice star Sir Alan Sugar, he added: "It occurred to me that one of the forthcoming new Members in your Lordships' House might be rather interested in that.

"I can envisage a television programme which would have as its slogan, "You're ostracised!""

More seriously, the Bishop of Durham stressed accountability had to be "built back" with the Commons holding real debates and scrutinising the Government.

A Government appointed outside Parliament - as in America - should be discussed, according to the clergyman.

"Certainly, the present system, with up to 100 MPs in ministerial roles and another 100 eagerly awaiting their chance, has eliminated the debating and accounting role of the Commons and reduced MPs to constituency activists who rubber-stamp the Executive's decrees instead of holding them up to the light of serious discussion," said the Bishop.

And now despite a consultation being launched on reform, a senior minister seems to have pre-judged the outcome after being quizzed in the Commons - warning changes might be "bad" for the country.

Justice Minister Michael Wills said: "I emphasise that proportional systems tend inherently to produce coalition Governments.

michael wills.jpg

"That may be a good thing for some parties, but it might not be a good thing for the country. First-past-the-post systems tend to produce clear majority winners and stable government.

"Although they tend to hand power to the biggest minority, the practice of forming coalition Governments often tends to hand power to the smallest minority. There is nothing inherently fair about that."

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