Tuesday 22 August 2017

MPs bring parliament into disrespect by crying over a clock.

For some reason I can't find actual footage of Labour MP Stephen Pound weeping over the silencing of a Clock but  here's the ridiculous man anyway




He was not alone as the Daily Beast  reported 

The extremely posh Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg, who doesn’t so much sound as if he has a plum in his throat as much as swallowed an entire plum orchard, told the Daily Mail: “I think Big Ben ought to be kept striking as much as possible during the repairs as long as it doesn’t deafen the work force. It would be symbolically uplifting for it to sound out our departure from the EU as a literally ringing endorsement of democracy.”Fellow Tory Peter Bone chimed in (sorry): “Big Ben should bong when we come out of the EU, absolutely. We are being liberated from the European Union superstate and Britain will again be a completely self-governing country. Where will the eyes of the world be? On Parliament and Big Ben. It would be very strange if at midnight on that day it does not chime out, very bizarre. It is the heart of our nation.”It perhaps says a lot about how confident Brexit supporters are in their mission that they need the symbolic seal of a bell to make them feel more secure.The British Prime Minister Theresa May even got involved, saying last week:

“Of course we want to ensure people’s safety at work but it can’t be right for Big Ben to be silent for four years. And I hope that the Speaker, as the chairman of the House of Commons commission, will look into this urgently so that we can ensure that we can continue to hear Big Ben through those four years.”

Its a symbol of  the ridiculous nature of our political system that 

Whilst children in the UK go hungry every day 
When we have people sleeping on the streets
When we have people with terminal illness forced to sign on .

Some of elected members seem to be worried that they can't here a clock striking.

If this is a symbol of anything it  is of the Westminster Bubble where our elected members both Left and Right are sucked into the establishment under the name of tradition.

Most MPs are referred to as "the Honourable Member for..." followed by the name of their constituency or as either "the Honourable gentleman" or "the Honourable lady".
If the MP being addressed is a member of the same party they are referred to as "my Honourable friend".
If the MP is a practising lawyer he or she is referred to as "Honourable and Learned".
If a member is a past or present member of the armed forces they may be addressed as "Honourable and Gallant", although this is very rarely used in the Commons nowadays.
"Right Honourable" indicates a member of the Privy Council - normally a past or present minister.

So I suppose a MP could be addressed as  as the Right honourable Learnrd and Gallant.

This is all part of using the "Traditions" of Westminster to make MPs feel important  and bring them into the system.

When a large number of SNP MP's were elected they The House of Commons speaker John Bercow them to stop clapping and "show some respect" for long-established conventions.

The threat will always be that if you don't do this then the speaker will not call you to speak.

Be part of the system or be silenced.

I don't know when he entered Parliament Stephen Pound had images of shaking up Parliament , but as yesterday events showed e is as much a part of the establishment as any High Tory.

There is an offence of bringing "Parliament into disrespect" . I would argue that yesterday, this was clearly done by the sight of a MP weeping over the silencing of a clock.

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