WILL there come a time when we all chuckle about the travails of May 2009 – the month that saw political reputations evaporate and parliamentary careers terminated? So far, the most notable head to roll is that of House of Commons Speaker Michael Martin. He may have escaped the fate of some of his predecessors, who were beheaded – but only just. As the expenses saga wore on, there was increasing, morbid fascination for the lurid details.
It was all far weirder than any reality television show where we might previously have glimpsed something of parliamentarians’ lives. Remember Matthew Parris, when he was a Tory MP, trying to live like a pauper? Or George Galloway dressed as a cat on Big Brother? They had nothing on recent incidents.
At another time, Nicholas and Ann Winterton standing down from their Cheshire fiefdom would have been big news, but it was lost in the welter of other departures. Anger grew and the leaked claims got curiouser and curiouser. A packet of hobnobs, dog-food, a rocking chair, a trouser press, an antique rug… It was reminiscent of the conveyor belt of prizes over which Bruce Forsyth used to preside on The Generation Game. Always on the list somewhere was a cuddly toy – which may be the only item conspicuous by its absence from the Honourable Members’ claims.
What does the furore, which relegated even Jordan and Peter Andre’s marriage bust-up to the inside pages, say about our political culture? Does the fact that a Liberal Democrat wanted a rocking chair indicate questionable third-party priorities? Surely it is telling that the hardly impecunious George Osborne wanted a chauffer-driven ride from his Greater Manchester constituency to Westminster? The jaw-dropping collection of invoices for moat-cleaning, swimming pool maintenance and tennis court heating demonstrate that, under the veneer of David Cameron’s egalitarian spin, the Conservative “squireocracy” is alive and well. “Duck pond-gate” may well become a symbol of the whole sorry shambles.
Housing seems to have been a Labour preoccupation: buying, kitting out and selling. As a second generation Bangladeshi myself, I wish I’d warned Shahid Malik of the possibility of potential dodgy Asian landlords. Sir Gerald Kaufman claimed he was “living in a slum”. Kitty Usher appears to have alienated the artex ceiling-loving vote with her interpretation of what constitutes bad taste.
Remember Labour’s 2005 general election pledges? “Your family better off, your family treated better and faster, your child achieving more, your country’s borders protected, your community safer, your children with the best start.” I found them vague and slightly mysterious – compared to the more tangible outcomes of the 1997 version with numerical targets, for examples, reducing class sizes. To the 2005 version, we could add “your widescreen television”. Perhaps they should have been more honest. “New Labour, new Britain, new TV.”
The fall-out has been massive: the usually sedate Question Time turning into a lynch mob, a formerly obscure BBC News 24 presenter becoming a YouTube hit for taking the bait when challenged by Lord Foulkes to reveal the details of her own salary. MPs who would normally do almost anything to be front-page news went to ground. But they still became household names overnight – for all the wrong reasons. At a time when the old-style press was being written off as insignificant, a new daily routine has emerged. First editions trumpeting fresh revelations are awaited by news channels and politicians with, respectively, excitement and trepidation.
Of course, much of the queried cash has been paid back. Hazel Blears was one of the first to do this, brandishing a cheque for the requisite amount of capital gains tax almost like someone who had struck the National Lottery jackpot. Others followed suit, claiming accounting was not their strong suit or pleading amnesia.
However, in a serious recession, this will not get any sympathy. Paying back public money claimed for treating dry rot – affecting a property not in London or the constituency of the MP in question – will not stop the rot in the bigger picture. Esther Rantzen has now been galvanised into action. A few mavericks in white suits might be good for democracy, but would a Commons Chamber full of them be workable?
From massage chairs to massaging the figures, trouser presses to trousering the cash, all the main parties have been implicated and mainstream politics is the loser. However, a better system can and must emerge. It is at last acknowledged that long-needed reform must be undertaken as a matter of emergency.
I’ll leave the last word to Morrissey, who celebrated, if that’s the right word, his 50th birthday this week. As he once intoned dryly on a Smiths’ song: “I can smile about it now, but at the time it was terrible.”
