A return to normality
Posted by Andrew Jones, MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, at 10:00, Wed 1 June 2011:
The past couple of months have been the most politically charged since the General Election. They have shown just how public opinion can change and how ‘local’ politics is becoming.
In Scotland, the Nationalists formed the first majority Parliament. In Wales, Labour came as close as you can come to forming an overall majority in the Assembly. The Conservatives gained seats at the local elections and the move to change our voting system was comprehensively lost. Six months ago none of these events were predicted by the pollsters or other onlookers on the political scene. Harold Wilson’s oft used maxim ‘a week is a long time in politics’ never seemed truer than on 6 May this year.
Parliament itself became more excitable as the local elections and the referendum approached. Like me, many of my colleagues enjoy being on the doorstep talking to real people about the real issues they face outside the Westminster bubble.
On 6 May many of my colleagues felt that it would be a return to normality in the House of Commons. But no week is ever ‘normal’. Her Majesty has made a hugely successful trip to Ireland and Barack Obama has spoken to MPs and Lords at Westminster.
Perhaps a stranger and more unexpected event was the use of parliamentary privilege to name a footballer who had taken out a so-called super injunction to keep details of his private life just that - private. Parliamentary privilege enables MPs to speak in the Chamber of the House of Commons without fear of legal action.
This case had become a little absurd. On the one hand, a law which seemed only available to the rich was being used to keep something secret that most people already knew. On the other, what right did people have to know the private life of the individual concerned?
The constitutional and legal issues will now play out and it will be interesting to see the arguments evolve. MPs make the law and the judiciary interpret it. This has been the rule for centuries and to my mind – with exceptions – it has stood the test of time.
Now, judges have interpreted the law and the modern digital world, with social networking and online chatter have made a mockery of it. So many are complicit in the publication of this footballer’s name that it would be impossible to take legal action against them all. And to top that one of the lawmakers themselves has added fuel to the debate by opening the floodgates for the media to report the footballer’s identity.
While it will be interesting to see how the various contradictions are resolved, as an MP I have had to think about Parliamentary privilege and its use. For me the clue is in the title. Parliamentary privilege is just that – a privilege. It is for each MP to judge how it should be used. For my own part, this would not have been one of those occasions.
Andrew Jones MP 01423 529614 andrew.jones.mp@parliament.uk www.facebook.com/andrew.jones.mp
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