Hey Porter

In the Observer yesterday, Henry Porter outlined his 'radical manifesto to revitalise Britain'.

Porter is prompted to pen his manifesto by a body politic in which, "our political parties are ineffectual, boring us all by pointlessly fighting it out on the dull morass that is the middle ground." Porter says "It's time for some new ideas ..." and then proceeds, disappointingly, to offer very little in the way of fresh thinking.

He talks about offering sabbaticals to those who have worked 15 years or more, and discusses reform of the NHS, prisons, and media ownership law. On Parliament though his 'radical manifesto' is thin and unpersuasive, resting as it does on the idea that a reduction in the number of MPs will, by itself, radically improve Parliament and its scrutiny of the executive.

There may be an argument for reducing the number of MPs but Porter's case appears to rest on the fatuous point that at present that there is not enough room for all MPs to sit in the Chamber at once. This is a bogus reason to justify reform but it also fails to acknowledge that the Chamber was purposefully designed to be small to create a better atmosphere for discussions than would be possible in a larger chamber. To suggest that "Vanuatu is better organised" than the UK system because the House of Commons chamber is small is akin to suggesting that Busted are superior to Schubert because they at least managed to finish recording their album.

(Personally I am more likely to listen to Busted than Schubert but you know what I mean...)

Porter says that he wants more MPs to, "defy the party whipping system that is crushing the life out of Parliament and the spirit of MPs". There are good grounds for the reform of the whipping system but Porter parrots the lazy assumption that the Commons is currently inhabited by 'lobby fodder'. Porter fails to acknowledge that there has actually been an increase in the number of MPs defying the Whip. Phillip Cowley and Mark Stuart at Revolts published a paper recently for the 2005-6 Session of Parliament which recounted that, of Labour MPs, there had been 95 rebellions in total, involving 114 Labour MPs, in the last session and that there were more rebellions as a percentage of votes than in any other first session since the war. This suggests that more MPs are independently minded than they might be given the credit for by conventional wisdom.

Porter mentions that enhancing the power of Parliamentary committees might be one way to more effectively scrutinise the actions of 'an ambitious executive' but fails to expand on this point, believing that the reduction in MPs is the main reform to secure the goal of improved scrutiny. Porter offers his manifesto as a basis for further discussion rather than as a fully formed wish-list but his section on Parliament reads like it was written on the back of a cigarette packet - or the kind of thing you get on one of those god-awful blogs.

I'll try and spark up a nicotine habit at lunchtime so I can pen my own cigarette packet manifesto but the Select Committee on Modernisation of the House of Commons has recently embarked on an enquiry into 'strengthening the role of the backbencher' which might provide some suggestions for Porter to include in his next manifesto piece.