Comment: A Day To Remember, Witnessing Our Parliament Roar Back Into Inaction

Published on: 26 Sep, 2019
Updated on: 26 Sep, 2019

Prime Minister Boris Johnson in Parliament yesterday. Image – BBC Parliament channel

By Martin Giles

“Cancel everything. It will be historic!” Who could refuse such an invitation?

It came from our MP Anne Milton on Tuesday, quick off the mark to get gallery tickets for yesterday (September 25), first day of the resumption of Parliament after the bombshell Supreme Court judgment, an offer no newsman could resist.

So I found myself watching the Attorney-General, Geoffrey Cox, refuse to apologise and try to defend the prorogation advice he had given the government, Surrey Heath’s Michael Gove explain, or not, the government’s Brexit preparations, Grant Shapps take questions on the Thomas Cook collapse, and Esher & Walton’s Dominic Raab tell the House what was happening to counter the threats posed by Iran.

But they were really just the warm-up acts to the main event, Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was waiting behind the Speaker’s chair like a player in the Wembley tunnel.

He had cut short his UN General Assembly visit and jetted back from New York overnight to make his entrance with an air of remarkable confidence, or arrogance (take your pick), the House greeting him with a predictable roar of mixed cheers and jeers.

The man next to me in the gallery made a pistol shape with his hand and pretended assassination. Another indication, if one were needed of the anger many, on both sides, feel.

Anne Milton yesterday – cheerful despite her disapproval of the tone of debate.

But I am getting ahead of myself. This is The Guildford Dragon so I was looking for a Guildford angle. There was only one, our no-deal Brexit rebel Ms Milton herself, so I watched her.

She was on the government backbenches, to the left of Speaker John Bercow as viewed on television, between fellow rebels Ed Vaizey and Rory Stewart, just along from Oliver Letwin and in front of Dominic Grieve. Although they had the Tory whip withdrawn the rebel group is too big, probably too powerful, to suffer any rebuff from those who are still, really, fellow Conservatives.

Their position meant the government was defending on two fronts. Attacks were volleyed with noisy energy from the opposition benches, as normal, but also, more quietly, on occasion from the rebels to their rear.

The normal battle lines of the House of Commons had been redrawn. The minority government was in a circle of wagons behind the front bench, not allowed to surrender, facing the main opposition one way and sniping attacks the other. No wonder the Speaker had to remind the Attorney-General to face the front so the microphone could better pick up his baritone voice.

Throughout the day, Ms Milton kept her powder dry. She is probably on the more moderate wing of the rebel group but it was clear she thoroughly disapproved of the vicious tone of the debate and the language used.

After the Attorney-General’s session, she looked up at me from the chamber and mimed a cuppa. I was happy to accept that invitation too. Over coffee, she told me she did not agree with the Attorney-General’s claim that this government was dead or that a general election was the solution. “It will not resolve anything,” Ms Milton said. “The new government will still not have a majority.”

Her next sentence was perhaps the most revealing. “I am not against a government of ‘national unity’.”

There are clearly cross-party negotiations behind the scenes. Perhaps this is what Ms Milton was involved with after our coffee? She is an experienced and respected MP, with 14 years on the benches and friendly contacts on all sides of the House from her time as a government whip. Tellingly, she was absent from the chamber for the next few hours.

If the opposition parties can agree they could force a motion of no confidence and put forward a “caretaker” prime minister.

Our MP feels such a regime could lead to the Parliamentary logjam breaker she has for some time felt necessary, another referendum. She claims this would not be a “second” referendum, and would have three options, no-deal, an agreed deal, or Remain, employing a single transferable vote system to determine the decision.

After the welcome break, I returned to the gallery. Eventually, I picked up from the screen display that the Prime Minister’s statement was expected at 6.30pm. Gradually, as in a theatre before curtain-up, the empty benches in the chamber filled, and in the public gallery too. The Press gallery, sparsely populated for most of the day became busy and there was the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg among other notable reporters from the national media. It was about to kick off.

What happened next has been well-covered elsewhere. To me, the level of passion and anger were not a surprise, reflecting the dug-in, irreconcilable positions of most of us on the Brexit issue.

Views of the rights and wrongs will be affected by those positions. For me, clearly, our Parliament and our democracy was at its lowest ebb.

Ms Milton, interviewed today on the BBC, said the question was about last night’s language. “We should put aside our Brexit [and] Remain T-shirts and put on a T-shirt that stands for Parliamentary democracy.”

Hope – G F Watts (1817 – 1904). On show in Watts Gallery, Compton

She added: “Yesterday was unacceptable and if we don’t do something to change this we are putting our Parliamentary democracy in threat.”

Will our MP’s government of national unity come about? Who knows? Nothing can be predicted but the continuing hostility and division on either side of the fault line that starts at Westminster and runs from top to bottom in our suffering country is deeply damaging.

Something has to give. But whether a “national unity”, under any government, is going to be possible, well, like the blindfolded single-stringed lyre player in George Watts’ painting, we can only hope.

Responses to Comment: A Day To Remember, Witnessing Our Parliament Roar Back Into Inaction

Jim Allen Reply

September 26, 2019 at 4:48 pm

Firstly, those who lost the referendum should accept the result. It is undemocratic to try and change it after the fact.

Secondly, those MPs who made claim they would respect the result but have displayed they will not, are attempting to overturn the result and should resign.

As for language, perhaps the Remainers should study their own accusational language, “racist” being the least but most popular, as well as “fools”, “uneducated”, “protectionist”, all aimed at people they have not, usually, even met.

While they accuse our Prime Minister, who, after all, is only trying to do as he’s been told by the majority of those who voted in the referendum.

The use of the word “surrender” is correct in relation to the Benn Bill. It gives the EU control over the timing of our exit.

While Ms Swinson has exceeded her authority by contacting the EU telling, apparently, the EU negotiators not to negotiate with our Prime Minister the leader of our parliamentary executive. Who does she think she is?

Three times the prime minister offered the opposition a chance for a vote of no confidence, in fact, he threw it open to the whole floor including Ms Swinson but not one Remainer took up the challenge.

Three times he has offered a general election but again it was refused. The way the opposition is behaving is damaging to the electorate’s right to be heard and a full five years might elapse before we have another general election.

So my prediction, some time in 2022 we will have a general election – if anyone bothers to vote, for we are now in the land of left-wing and anti-democratic extremists determined to flout the will of the people
Keith Witham Reply

September 26, 2019 at 9:42 pm

Your headline “Parliament roars back into inaction” sums it up. What exactly are MPs going to discuss in the next three and a half weeks that they have not discussed, ad nauseum, in the last three and a half years, with no conclusion other than deadlock?

Boris Johnson did not “break the law” as widely alleged. On Tuesday morning the judges of the Supreme Court made new law by interpreting our unwritten constitution. Boris Johnson followed the precedent set by all his predecessors. Had this ruling been in effect in previous years practically every previous Prime Minister would have “broken the law” as well. The case was politically motivated by well-funded anti-Brexit campaigners to help undermine the government at this crucial time, and the Court gave them what they wanted.

The Labour Party, led by those with Marxist/Communist sympathies, and the non-Liberal, anti-Democrats have shown their true colours. Having now both had their party conferences, they voted not to recess Parliament to try and stop the Conservatives from having their party conference. Deeply anti-democratic.

The non-Liberal anti-Democrats now want to just cancel the 2016 Referendum, ignore the majority of voters, because they don’t agree with, and have never agreed with or accepted, the Leave decision of the people.

The Marxist Party is refusing to tell voters of their position on whether we should leave the EU before a general election. It’s no coincidence that the Communist Party of Britain put up no candidates at the last general election, and advised it’s supporters to vote Labour.

Boris Johnson is speaking for the majority of the people that voted, 17.4 million to be precise. The problem is Parliament. Voters in two-thirds of constituencies voted to leave the EU, but two-thirds of MPs supported Remain and didn’t like the decision of the people. They now want to do all they can to stop Brexit.

This Parliament is a zombie Parliament, incapable of doing anything, which is why a general election is needed. But Jeremy Corbyn and the others are all running scared of an election because Boris Johnson speaks for the people. Those who think otherwise should support a general election to decide as soon as possible.

I sincerely hope that Boris Johnson succeeds in taking the UK out of the EU at 11pm on October 31. He is the only one with the guts to do it, a man who says what he means and means what he says. No ifs, no buts. And thank goodness.

Keith Witham is the Conservative county councillor for Worplesdon.
Stuart Barnes Reply

September 27, 2019 at 8:59 am

What chance have the people got against the whole weight and big money of the anti-democratic establishment? If only we had an impartial Speaker, BBC, lawyers, and so on. It would help also if MPs did not lie by promising to abide by the people’s decisions and then do the opposite.

In particular, why should MPs, elected under one label, who then switch midstream to another, not be compelled to undergo a bye-election?

The outrage of the “Surrender” Bill is only the latest aspect of the betrayal. Boris Johnson would not have been my first choice for PM but at least he is trying to obey the clear instruction of the people to leave the corrupt and intensely hated EU.
Linda Cooper Reply

September 27, 2019 at 3:21 pm

In response to comments from Jim Allen, Keith Witham and Stuart Barnes; well said!
RWL Davies Reply

September 28, 2019 at 7:10 am

Our learned friends Lord Burnett, who outranks all Supreme Court members, the Lord Chief Justice; Sir Terence Etherton, the Master of the Rolls; and Dame Victoria Sharp, the President of the Queen’s Bench Division all ruled that the Prime Minister acted legally in proroguing.

As for the 25th September HoC sitting it only succeeded in increasing the contempt that informed citizens feel towards its current behaviour.

As someone once nearly said, “if that’s democracy in action then I’m a banana”.

And, a so-called government of national unity will be anything but and will exacerbate current tensions.

What was the referendum result again – 52% Leave, 48% Remain?

A general election soon is the only solution.
John Armstrong Reply

September 28, 2019 at 6:53 pm

The main outcome in the short term of this “Day To Remember” seems to be the continuing controversy on the use of language.

They were still going on about it this morning on LBC Global Radio, for hours. They would not allow a contributor to use the word “traitor”. There were objections to the word “unelected” to describe the Supreme Court judges and to the expression “take to the streets”.

It’s OK it would appear for climate activists and Remainers to take to the streets, as they have done on a number of occasions, even to dragging the kids out of school. Why wasn’t that deemed unlawful? Brexiteers cannot even say the words let alone fulfil them.

September the 25, 2019 will come to be remembered though as “The Day The Music Died” (from American Pie by Don McLean). A song of loss. The day the public could see the visceral hatred bubble up and the Mother of Parliaments boiling off before a global audience. Honourable Members no more. From now on it will be the Supreme Court.