Thursday 31 October 2019
Election in the bleak mid winter.
As argued in the previous post, my strong preference is (now was) for this parliament to continue scrutinising Johnson's Brexit Bill, hoping for an amendment to put it to a referendum, and then, after the referendum, and whatever the result, have the General election.
Alas, that is not to be.
I regard the Fixed Term Parliament Act (FTPA) as the one great Liberal Democrat constitutional gain of the 2010 Coalition (the other two, for electoral reform and House of Lords reform, were both scuppered by combinations of Tory deceit and Labour pusillanimity).
The purpose of the FTPA was to make our politics fairer by taking away from the incumbent prime minister the right to call a General Election just when he/she felt the governing party had the best chance of winning. It is a sad irony that we Liberal Democrats, instigators of this splendid act, should be the first to drive a coach and horses through it.
The argument is that the Liberal Democrat and SNP leaders had concluded that there was no longer any possibility of obtaining a majority for a People's Vote amendment from the existing MPs. Well, they are more in touch with their parliamentary colleagues than I am, so they may well be right. but I can't help thinking they were somewhat premature. All that was needed was for the Labour leadership to change its mind, which, now that the election has been called, they have done.
Admittedly, they want a People's Vote on a Withdrawal deal that they have negotiated rather the Johnson deal they may have amended, but it is a move in the right, if somewhat hypothetical, direction.
Mr Johnson was keen to label the existing Commons as a "zombie" parliament," simply on the grounds that it could not be relied upon to do what he wanted. That, of course, is the function of parliament - to scrutinise the government's proposals, and, where they are felt to be lacking, propose improvements.
The British constitution was working well.
To make a comparison with Johnson's much admired America, the US president can't just sack Congress because it doesn't jump to his wishes: he (not yet a she) has to wait for the Constitution to take its course. And, with Donald Trump in the presidency, thank goodness.
However, we are where we are and must make the best of it.
Happily our Liberal Democrat message is clear: we will do all we can to "Stop Brexit." It could be best to stop there, and maybe that is what our campaigns team will decide. Or we may be forced to complicate matters by giving "further and better particulars": that in the(unlikely but not impossible) event that we win an over-all majority we shall simply Revoke Article 50, and if we need to work with others less determined we shall support a People's Vote which contains the option to Remain.
Al least this twin policy will be easier to explain than Labour's.
A winter campaign puts both Labour and we Liberal Democrats at a disadvantage, since our strengths are in "boots on the ground" prepared to canvass. But with darkness falling around tea-time effective canvassing time is seriously reduced. The Tories by contrast, have few members but bags of money for targetted mailshots and the even more invidious super-targetted digital messages. Fortunately one of the social media on which these "dark arts" can be practised has decided to outlaw them, but so far (the larger?) Facebook hasn't.
It will not be an easy campaign for anyone except the SNP, who seem destined to sweep the board again in Scotland.
In England Labour are hoping for the sort of boost they achieved under Mr Corbyn in 2017, but part of that was due to Mrs May's ineptitude. Johnson may be a philanderer, serial liar and opportunist, and totally unsuited for the office of Prime Minister, but he is (or was) an effective campaigner. He won the London Mayoralty not once but twice, and London is a Labour-leaning city. Here's hoping he will not be so effective on the larger scale.
I regard the Fixed Term Parliament Act (FTPA) as the one great Liberal Democrat constitutional gain
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't surprise me that you are wrong about this as so much else… the FTPa is a terrible act of constitutional vandalism, for many reasons, but the most obvious of which in the current situation is that it has imported into out political landscape that awful, alien feature of the USA's system: the goverment shutdown.
When, in the USA, the President and Congress cannotagree, the whole country grinds to a halt (and, occasionally, the President has it off with an intern in the Oval Office). That was supposed to be unable to happen over here: when Parliament and the government were implacably opposed, there was supposed to be an election which would break the deadlock by bringing forth either a new Parliament or a new government. Thus the smooth running of the country could continue.
The Fixed-term Parliaments Act, as we have seen, stopped that. I remember this concern being expressed at the time, and the response was that it would never happen in practice because no oppposition would ever refuse the opportunity to have a general election. Well, they did, and we have seen the dysfunction that resulted.
One of the first acts of the new Parliament must be to replace the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. Unfortunately (this being part of the constitutional vandalism) doing so is not as simple as just revoking it, as while it is a tried and tested principle that prerogative powers can be transferred from the monarch by statute, there is no precedent for what happens to those powers if the transferring statute is revoked. Do they simply return to the monarch? No one knows. It would be uncharted waters. And goodness knows in the last couple of years we've had more than enough constitutional innovation to last us for the next couple of centuries at least.
Perhaps the least damaging option is simply to change the two-thirds majority required for an early general election to a simple majority, as it seems that that is how thigns have worked out in practice. However really the Fixed-term Parliaments Act was written for, and only made sense within, the precise situation in terms of balance of seats that pertained to the aftermath of the 2010 election, and it ought to have had a sunset clause that specified it only applied to that Parliament (unless, perhaps, renewed specifically by the next Parliament after the next election, and so forth).
That, of course, is the function of parliament - to scrutinise the government's proposals, and, where they are felt to be lacking, propose improvements.
No it isn't. The function of Parliament is to legislate. You get the impression that some people these days think that the government is merely the executive committee of Parliament, appointed to run the country on Parliament's behalf and answerable to it. This is not at all the case, and I thik comes from a misunderstanding of the phrase 'Parliamentary supremacy', which does not mean that Parliament is supreme over the executive — what it really means is that Parliament cannot bind its successors.
Fortunately one of the social media on which these "dark arts" can be practised has decided to outlaw them, but so far (the larger?) Facebook hasn't.
You know, I can't help thinking that if Remain had won the referendum we would be endlessly hearing, as we did in the wake of Obama's victories, of how brilliant social media targetting was for democracy and how its skillful use by campaigns was the future of politics. It really does seem there's a double-standard here where is the side you agree with takes a tool and uses it to win the tool is the best thing since Archemedes really needed to get into a bottle of wine, whereas if the other side does the same then the very same tool because the work of the Devil.
As always you argue enthusiasticly but I think mistakenly.
ReplyDeleteOn the Fixed Term Parliament, remember that one definition of democracy is "government by discussion." Forcing the executive to discuss its policies and seek compromises rather than petulantly seeking a fresh mandate could lead to better government.
And of course it is Parliament's function to scrutinise the actions of the executive, not just rubber-stamp their policies. That's why we have Question Time (for ministers as well as the PM), special committees and detailed examination of proposed new laws.
On "dark arts," as you well know, expenditure on "open" election material is limited by law, and the material must bear the name of the publisher. This enables other parties to examine and correct, if necessary, misleading claims. Targetted communications via the internet are subject to no such restrictions. They clearly need to be to ensure a more level playing-field.
There's a whole book about this by a Peter Pomerantsev. See:
https://wordery.com/this-is-not-propaganda-peter-pomerantsev-9780571338634?currency=GBP>rck=eVllU1d3em5OYkQ2ZnVVUnc5MkNzTXVBWjFMOGN3Z29HcDc4czk1NWtNNjVxY21pWTBVWU13M2ZaMXlwSFVydkdLT0U4bVdrTTRveWl4ajlITG1zb2c9PQ&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIurD-_IjJ5QIVgrTtCh03qQhEEAQYASABEgJcI_D_BwE
On the Fixed Term Parliament, remember that one definition of democracy is "government by discussion."
ReplyDeleteThat's no definition of democracy. You can have discussion in oligarchies or in Communist states, neither of which is democracy.
The only definition of democracy is 'rule by the people' (as opposed to rule by the monarch, rule by the nobility, rule by the Party, rule by the preists, rule by the judges and lawyers, etc etc).
But to address the substantive point: Yes, it may be useful to have a dialogue between different branches or houses. But when the two are so implacably opposed that nothing can get done, where there is no road to compromise possible, as seen in the USA when they have their government shutdown and here recently, what is to be gained by simply continuing in the dysfunctional situation with no way out?
If the government is adamant for A, and Parliament equally adamant for not-A, and there is no prospect of either changing its mind, then who can decide which of A or not-A is to be done? In a democracy, only the people can have that power. Hence why we are supposed to (and always would have up until 2010) had a general election n that circumstance.
And of course it is Parliament's function to scrutinise the actions of the executive, not just rubber-stamp their policies. That's why we have Question Time (for ministers as well as the PM), special committees and detailed examination of proposed new laws.
You get to the point at the end there: new laws. It is, as I wrote above, the function of Parliament to legislate, not to govern or to overrule the government; still less, as the Surrender Act attempts, to govern itself via legislation.
Of course governing requires the ability to legislate; this is why the government requires the confidence of the House of Commons, and why, if it loses that confidence, there should be a general election. Which is, thankfully, now happening.
On "dark arts," as you well know, expenditure on "open" election material is limited by law, and the material must bear the name of the publisher. This enables other parties to examine and correct, if necessary, misleading claims. Targetted communications via the internet are subject to no such restrictions. They clearly need to be to ensure a more level playing-field.
And yet, I still can't imagine you making this argument if it had been the Remain side which had won in 2016 by skillful deployment of targetted communications. Certainly nobody was much bothered when Obama won after a campaign which involved innovative use of social media. Again: when a tool is used successfully by the 'right' side, people praise it as the future. When the 'wrong' side succeeds by the same techniques, they suddenly become dangerous threats to democracy.