WHEN did it happen? When were truth, integrity and intelligence abandoned in Westminster politics? Was it a sudden swing? Maybe when Boris Johnson put £350m a week on that red bus? He knew it was a lie but thought: “What the hell, people will want to believe it.” Was it when the the Westminster Unionist leaders made promise after promise of more powers during the independence referendum that they had no intention of ever delivering? Maybe it was the expenses scandal when MP’s flipped their houses, made false claims and even thought it morally acceptable to ask the tax payer to pay for floating duck hotels and moat cleaning services? Was it even earlier when right-wing billionaires started buying up the press and using their front pages to support political policies, parties and even wars that were to their liking? Political parties only get to campaign every few years and then they are subject to Electoral Commission rules whereas many big media owners the world over have found they can campaign and influence all year round. Indeed for some the main reason for being a media owner is influence, they can’t be short of advisors telling them where they could get a better return on their money.

Labour, during its hegemony over Scotland. worked hard to have place-men (and women) in positions of power and influence in public life, in the media and particularly at the BBC. The combination of burgeoning right-wing editorial control over many popular press titles and left-wing favouritism in public broadcasting (in Scotland anyway) may have created some sort of balance for a while, but its gone now. Under Blair, Labour’s lurch to the right brought an acceptance of the divine right of Westminster-centric, global consumerism and financial services-led thinking to rule unchallenged in all but a few of the more radical publications. The BBC stopped being the beacon of truth and integrity that had defined its early reputation (still does, with many older viewers) and became the voice of the establishment, pouring scorn on all new thinking and editorially favouring the parties of the establishment over those that would challenge the state quo.

Westminster politics seems to be morphing into a grotesque pantomime, only in the case of David Mundell he’s the one shouting: “Oh yes you can have more powers” and: “Oh no you can’t” simultaneously. Such behaviour would have brought ridicule and embarrassment in the past but now we have this accepted term “post-truth politics” it has become the norm and lies almost pass without mention nor challenge. Lies are often obvious but bias is subtle.Today a BBC headline screams the terrible news that university offer rates have dropped 1.6 per cent to 59 per cent. On the same report the SNP press release states that we have just seen the “highest ever number of university offers for Scottish young people”. Both the SNP and the BBC are spinning the story, the problem is the BBC shouldn’t spin and should just be telling it straight. It is hard to prove bias. though: the headline writer (usually not the journalist) is just highlighting what they think is the key message in the report. The article below it is actually reasonably balanced but the reader has been told to focus on the bad news element by the headline. The same report also points out that we have the highest-ever entry rate to Scotland’s universities from Scotland’s most deprived areas – with a 3.7 per cent rise in admissions since 2006. I would have gone with that as a headline, partially as it explains the previous two highly contradictory statements. There is nothing wrong with a politician spinning the news or a newspaper stating an political opinion (I write for one that boasts its political motivation on its masthead) but when truth becomes inconvenient, democracy becomes irrelevant.

Throw into the mix falling newspaper circulations and the growing importance of social media which also lives in a post-truth world with its false news and widely believed myths, and democracy may be holed below the waterline. Social media has two main faults. Firstly it has become a say-anything culture in which you can tell an absolute lie and get it shared a million times, and most who read that lie will never hear the truth as it is often less interesting and so less shareable. The other main fault is the opinion silos that form online. Given the propensity for rudeness and broadcasting rather than listening in social media, people tend to friend and listen to only those that agree with them and so people of the left and right, climate changers and deniers, Yes supporters and Unionists don’t engage but simply exist in politically exclusive social-media echo chambers. This leads to tribalism and misinformation but who has the right to call themselves the arbitrator of truth? Certainly not the Government or any political party, not the BBC and absolutely not Facebook!

So how can those of no political tribe find the unbiased, truthful unspun information that is the lifeblood of democracy? How can they make up their minds and vote with integrity? Many think they can’t and the historical downward direction of voting figures are evidence to the slow death of educated democracy. Maybe we need a Truth Commissioner, someone to sit on the panel of every political debate and press a red button every time a lie is told.

“Mundell, you are sin binned for the last five minutes of this debate!” Maybe 2.5 per cent of all political party campaign monies should be diverted, put a truth levy on every newspaper and even take a cut of BBC licence fee, to massively fund a charity such as FactCheck.org. Just as hotels have star ratings then maybe over time newspapers and TV news channels end up with truth ratings and spin scores. Maybe there is a social solution: if enough trusted posters object to an article on a news site then it has to be taken down until the Truth Commissioner approves it. Can there ever be such a thing as a Truth Commissioner? Would anyone ever be able to fill those shoes without becoming the story? Until we figure this out voters will have to rely on their own gut feel as to whether they are being educated and informed or brainwashed and misinformed – that’s not a promising outlook, but hey that’s just my opinion.