There is a protocol in the British Parliament that “grants certain legal immunities for Members of both Houses to allow them to perform their duties without interference from outside of the House”. This is called Parliamentary Privilege, and allows a Member of Parliament (when in the House) to say things about another person which would otherwise consitute slander and be open to legal prosecution; even to lie. They cannot be directly accused of lying by another Member of Parliament due to another convention concerning the use of Unparliamentary Language, which precludes this. It is also of note that as is generally the way with all things political, the only judgement concerning these rules is Parliament itself.
There have been two events in recent days which underline for me the idiocy and the danger of allowing these two conventions to continue.
Firstly, the Home Office have finally responded (after 12 months) to a Freedom of Information Request concerning ‘statistics’ presented by the government of the day as valid, when in fact, they have no evidence to substantiate their claims. In 2021 the then Home Secretary Priti Patel told Parliament that “70% of individuals on small boats are single men who are effectively economic migrants”. This claim was made without evidence, and was presented to the Parliament and public as fact. These claimes have been subsequently supported by the current Home Secretary Suella Braveman when she said “There is considerable evidence that people are coming here as economic migrants, illegally.” Both statements are clearly presented as fact, and both are totally unsubstantiated by government records.
The second example is of a recent advertisement by the Labour Party in preparation for the local elections in which they state that the current Prime Minister does not wish to impose custodial sentences on people found guilty of the sexual assault of minors. The claim is made that during the governance of the Conservative Party, some “4500 Adults convicted of sexually assaulting children” but not given prison time. Rishi Sunak has been Prime Minister for 6 months, and only an MP since 2015, and the statistic covers the governance of the Conservatics since 2010. The statement is therefore disingenious at best, and a downright lie at worst.
I despair.
Public communications are just that: public. Therefore they can be heard and repeated by all. Politicians (despite an evident lack of public trustt by the public) are in a position of power and influence, in addition to which they have regular access to national broadcast and print mediq for their statements. These two together create an environemnt in which what politicians say can be heard and repeated very widely across the nation – and is likely to be repeated regularly. Surely then, there should be some check on what they say and how they say it? Outside of Parliament, the only bounds on a politician are those that are on all of us; despite very few of us having the same level of ability to have our comments broadcast across the nation… (I mean how many people even read this blog?!)
As an individual, I am interested in politics and as such, I try to follow what is being said and by whom. It is true that I am able to take the time to conduct research in certain areas (such as for the preparation of these blogs for example), but I cerrtainly would not be able to find sufficient time to be able to review every single statement made by all politicians. I am therefore unable to judge empirically much of what is said, and I find myself having to take much of it on faith. Logical fallacies I can question if I notice them, yet even noticing that someone is lying does not provide me with the truth of the situation, it merely causes me to doubt what the person is saying.
Both of the examples cited above are deliberate attemps to present a false narrative – this is quite simply gaslighting. Neither the statement that 70% of migrants are economic, nor the statement that Rishi Sunak does not want to imprison those who sexually assault children are proveable. These people are running our country – why are they allowed to say things they cannot prove?
Why are they evel allowed to make claims about their opponents? Prime Ministers during Prime Minister’s Questions frequently avoid a question question by standing up and loudly shouting that they are better than the opposing party. Is that what passes for debate in our democracy? Is this how we choose our repsentatives? We select them based on the lies they say about the others? What happened to judging people on their performance? What happened to examining evidence rather than simply allowing the environment to be polluted by disparraging insults and false claims?
Both the lying about statistics and creating false advertising about your opponents are shameful acts of malignancy. Allowing this culture to proceed (which is what the parties and the leaders are doing every day) is reprehensible in the extreme. As far as I am concerned, the party leaders and individually culpable for these events, this behaviour and this culture. It is quite eveident to me that our politicians, political parties and party leaders are incapable of ensuring clean and appropriate communications to the public.
These people are not worthy of being representatives, they are not worthy of your votes.
It seems very clear to me therefore, that the utterances of politicians and political parties must be very finely regulated in oder to prevent the nefarious misrepresentation of things. If we want democracy, we have to prohibit politicians from talking about anything other than themselves and thier own policies – including in public. Everything they say must be provable. When you are stopped by the police in the UK you have 1 week to produce your documents at the station… why don’t we impose the same on politicians? If you cannot prove it, you cannot say it.
In the HoC and the HoL mebers should not mislead if they do they should correct the record at the earliest opportunity. For ministers and members to mislead deliberately results in breaking the ministerial code and lead to sanctions or ultimately a recall petition and a bye election. The HoC authorities, opposition MPs, select committees hold the government of the day to account through these processes. In recent times issues around misleading have increased as the ‘truth’ has been treated a moveable feast, but broadly the system works. The lies told outside of parliament are a different matter as I see no individual held to account for the lies in the 2016 Referendum and many are culpable, Johnson, Gove, Farage, Cummings, Hannan, et al, so when you can get away with lying on that scale things only get worse.
When it comes down to local politics lying dominates too, currently we will be electing a new council on the Wirral, Tory leaflets tell voters they have saved libraries from closure (they hav’nt), they opposed council tax rises (they didn’t) and they have saved the Green Belt from housing development (they havn’t). Whether their lies influence voters is difficult to tell, I have been canvassing and the Green Belt issue is the only one which has come up on the doorstep, so face to face contact does give an opportunity to attempt to correct the record, the local press (Wirral Globe and L’pool Echo) have also helped in this regard but it is an uphill battle.
I see the Labour leaflet as a culmination of playing fast and loose with the truth and there is a whole debate to be had around this form of political attack in terms of morality and standards what remains a fact is the crippling of the Criminal Justice System through funding cuts since 2010 has produced an outcome that sees criminals not being prosecuted.
Much as I laud the effort that is put into the political process by people like yourself, clearly these processes do not work. If the presentation of fact is down to people knocking on doors then we are in trouble – what happens if I’m not in when you knock? In addition to which, if you are there as a supporter of one particular party, then there is a chance that I will belive your arguments to be partisan and therefore ignore them. The HoC and HoL’s processes clearly are inadequate, waiting 12 months for an FOI enquiry is ridiculous, and the record STILL hasn’t been corrected. The Labour advert may well be a culmination of a lack of truth in the political process, I do not believe however that this justifies the lack of moral leadership that approved its release. The entire system is broken, and it cannot be fixed by those who break it even further.
The lies told outside of parliament are not policed, and are only subject to the scrutiny of indiciduals, many of whom may not have the financial weight to be able to prosecute. The system is a farce, and there is little in the way of debate surrounding these things. Unless regulation is brought in and an independent body tasked with approving all political statements and adverts BEFORE they are released, the situation will continue and the ‘polite agreement’ that MPs should not lie will continue to be broken again and again, always supported by those in power. I would be on very weak ground teaching my daughter not to say that people were stupid if I went around saying people were stupid… so how can a liar accuse another of lying and have any moral agency?
Both Labour and the Conservatices have shown themselves to be vaccuous bodies intent only on gaining power to push their agendas, and much as I may align more closely with one agenda rather than another… then ends do not justify the means. Politicians of all colours seem to disregard this.
What you seem to be arguing for is the sort one party state apparatus that controls debate, democratic politics is adverserial and is all the better for it. Voters on the doorstep broadly welcome the opportunity to speak to candidates, raise their own issues or tell you they are not interested and don’t vote. Certainly around here Labour has done much work to counter the misinformation the Tories have put about concerning the Green Belt, 47% of land on the Wirral is Green Belt, voters recognise and welcome the support they have had to present detailed protests to the planning inspectorate. There is also an organisational aspect to canvassing, it enables party activity to be widely seen but the more important focus is identifying support which is particularly important when it comes to getting the vote out on election day.
On the attack ad., 700+ child sex abusers remain free, 1% of rapes reach court, low level crime is ignored Labour is pointing it out in a particularly blunt fashion and I would point out that the message has got to the people who it is intended for, the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth can be left to others. That fact remains that the criminal justice system is in crisis and labour has a plan to deal with the crisis. This week the campaign will move on to the economy and I expect further robust messaging and debate.
Adversarial debate is fine, so long as it has no room for lies. It shouldn’t be the responsibility of engaged individuals like you to have to correct the record; it is a key principal of any working democracy. Unfortunately it isn’t, and it bodes badly for the UK if even the current opposition are comfortable employing such a tactic. I do not see how one can hope to engender a behavioural change by adopting the very behaviour you hope to change.
The criminal system in the UK may be broken, and yes, this is a responsibility of the current governement of which Rishi Sunak is the head. This does not however mean that simply because he hasn’t done anything abou it, he thinks it is OK.
I agree, the link between Sunak and the imprisonment of sex offenders is tenuous and it has caused offence but the Tories campaigning would like people to think they have only been in power since Sunak became leader hence his 5 promises: 1) Halve inflation. 2) Grow the economy 3) Reduce national debt. 4) Cut NHS waiting lists, 5) Stop the boats. We were told these are the people’s priorities and they will be able to judge him and his government on the outcomes against the ‘priorities’. Somehow or anyhow they are seeking to distance themselves from their record of 14 yrs of ineptitude and chaos that is UK governance. And Brexit is not even mentioned.