STAND DOWN MICHAEL, STAND DOWN PLEASE
Saturday, December 6, 2008 at 10:02AM Pl
eased to see that MP Bob Marshall-Andrews has become the first Labour MP to publicly call for Commons Speaker Michael Martin to resign.
His call comes after police probing alleged Home Office leaks arrested Tory MP Damian Green and searched his Westminster office without a warrant. An official under Mr Martin granted the search, but the Labour MP said the Speaker should be held responsible. Mr Marshall-Andrews said he no longer had any confidence in the Speaker.
He's right. Michael Martin was fully aware of what was going to happen and chose not to act to stop it. He has now attempted to pass the blame for this dereliction of HIS duty to his junior colleague the Sergeant Jill Pay. He is a TRULY pathetic and contemptible figure and the sooner he goes the better, but of course he will not stand down. Why? Well, that would mean a by-election for Labour in Glasgow, where Martin hails from. And the LAST thing Gordon Brown wants is another by-election. So the worst Speaker in the history of the Commons will stay in place until 2010. That's how little respect Labour has for the integrity of the Commons. Bob Marshall-Andrews deserves to be congratuated for having the cajones to speak out against this betrayal of Parliament.
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Reader Comments (13)
If he stood down (or was sacked), can the contemptible git not simply return to the backbenches?
No - by tradition to the Lords. Lord Help Us of the Gorbals.
Iluvni, it is convention that after leaving the Speaker's Chair, that a former speaker should play no part in Party Politics. If, like happened in 1997, the Speaker's party is defeated, he or she normally, even when they are re-elected to the Commons, will normally resign and be given a Peerage. They also then normally sit in the House of Lords as a cross bencher.
Bring back Betty Boothroyd !
Gorbals Mick's conduct is even more contemptible than is commonly thought.
He did away with the tradition of appointing a former Army officer as Serjeant at Arms - not his kind of chap really. So he over promoted Mrs Pay whose previous job was managing the stationary cupboard and who is simply not suited.
He didn't have the decency to concult Her majesty who would be appointed as the Queen's representative in Parliament, causing a right old stink which was hushed up. Apparently Her Maj was extremely miffed at the insult - but then what does she expect when she's been pushed about by her ministers for so long? Start sticking up for yourself, us and the Constitution for goodness sake. It's your job.
Most importantly here, and one reason why the Queen went ballistic, this buffoon also stripped the Serjeant at Arms of responsibility for security.
Mick Martin gave a statement to the Commons this week in which he heaped the entire blame for allowing the rozzers in without a warrant onto Mrs Pay, yet she had no authority to bar them. It was he who stripped the position of that role.
Who then is responsible for security and who was at fault for allowing the police in?
Mick Martin, Speaker of the house of Commons who abrogated for himself this very job when he appointed the present Serjeant at Arms and who now blames an entirely blameless officer of the House.
However the Tories shouldn't push for this, the worst and most partisan Speaker ever, to go. Until 1997 the tradition was for the House to vote for a minority Speaker. Balance and transparency were the order.
However the Labour faction chucked away this tradition when they followed a Labour Speaker by voting for another in 1997 in this contemptible fool.
But he'll be gone in 2010 and the end is near. If he's forced out now labour will vote again for a younger, Brownite, Labour Speaker who the House will be stuck with for at least seven years.
Tradition and convention....when did that ever matter to the Labour Party?
He should have remembered the tradition of Blackrod.
Charles -
Iluvni is right. The Labour Party is a movement of revolutionaries, wreckers and vandals. They cannot leave anything untouched. Even where something works fine they must meddle for the sake of it. Genuinely, this country is constitutionally knackered. We're just not serious enough anymore to realise it.
It wasn't always like this. The Labour Party used to be patriotic and quite conservative but that party was taken over by Trots and Stalinists in the 1970s and 80s. They're the people in charge now.
Pete, tis a pity that now Blackrod is just a show for the tourists. Even King Charles had to storm the place himself. Now, it's the Speaker that gives entry to HM forces.
Charles -
Well in that sense, how can the British people be outraged when they no longer take their traditions seriously?
Your average Briton probably doesn't recognise the significance of Black Rod having the door of the Chamber closed in his face. Even some of those who do cannot see that without frequent, blatant demonstrations of principles, those principles will die.
Even your clear, unarguable, written constitution is only as good as its enforcement.
Charles -
I forgot to add - I said in here last week that I'm delighted with the arrest and detention for nine hours of the Conservative MP Damien Green.
I'm still delighted. In fact the more I think of it the happier I am. I even emailed my own (Conservative) MP to tell him how chuffed I am.
I hope more of them are arrested. I hope Damien Green was strip searched and had his DNA taken.
Our entire political class has treated our liberties with contempt for so long we're surprised when a single one of them stands on a principle. The Conservatives are as guilty as the Labour faction in this.
Notice - when a woman was arrested merely for standing at the Cenotaph reading out the names of our war dead - they had nothing to say.
The police have (at the last count) 266 reasons to enter our homes - without a warrant. MPs have nothing to say about this.
While the State built the apparatus to watch and spy and listen and snoop and pry on the minutest details of our private lives - they had nothing to say.
But one of them is arrested - they press the nuclear button.
Good.
As I told my MP, before they get uppity about their own precious selves, they can start giving a damn about the people who send them to Parliament.
Thanks Pete, I was trying to figure out your glee at the arrest, and your further lamintation over the loss of tradition. Nay, more than just loss of tradition, but a constitutional breach.
Great comment at 10.00pm Pete