BEFORE I get into the main topic of my column, I hope you’ll let me off with a brief word about the ongoing health crisis. By the time is published, we’ll be into another weekend of lockdown. You might find the temptation to breach the restrictions growing, but please don’t.
As was reported at the Scottish Government press briefing, the reproductive rate of the virus has reduced to less than one, through the hard work everyone has been doing. The margins are slim, however, and if we don’t stick with it, we will see that rate grow, and many more people will die unnecessarily. Stay home and save lives.
Now on to what else I have to say. The problems with Westminster are countless. The building itself is a mess, it really is falling apart. There are rats and mice running about the place, the House of Commons Chamber is too small to fit all the MPs and if it was any other building environmental health or the Health and Safety Executive would have it shut down.
As I have said many times before, the major issues surround the processes for conducting business in the House of Commons are ridiculously out of date. Voting in the House of Commons takes about 20 minutes per vote, and on a fairly standard evening you can be voting five, six or seven times. You vote by entering a yes or no lobby alongside hundreds of your colleagues and, one by one, a clerk strikes your name off a register as you pass through a little door at the other end. In contrast, in the Scottish Parliament, you vote by pressing a button… As well as the voting issues, the rule of no clapping, not being allowed to name the person you are speaking to or about, the braying like donkeys, the bouncing up and down for hours at a time, the pomp and circumstance that surrounds every single proceeding, all shape up to make Westminster look absolutely ridiculous.
I appreciate its deep and undeniable historic value but acknowledging that history at the expense of having a practical and efficient parliament is just not worth it. I have long argued that a functioning parliament is more important than having a traditional one.
I noted that the Daily Express gleefully mocked my colleague Ian Blackford for calling for this on Tuesday. In typical Express style, it used the headline: “Ian Blackford pulled apart as SNP MP’s call for virtual parliament branded ‘impossible’.”
The headline on its website went so far as to say Ian was calling for “anarchy”, which is an interesting way of looking at things. At any rate, it turns out Ian was right and it isn’t impossible.
READ MORE: Plans for 'virtual parliament' via video link approved
Most attempts to modernise Parliament are met with scepticism or scorn or are completely dismissed. The progress that has been made over the last few years are, in my opinion, baby steps. At a time of global emergency, having a functioning parliament is surely crucial.
Journalists have been doing as best a job as they can holding the UK Government to account at its daily press conferences. This is welcome, and it is welcome that the UK and Scottish governments continue to hold these conferences each day, but regular press conferences are not a substitute for a parliament being able to hold a government to account. That’s why many of us MPs have been calling for a virtual parliament to be set up.
On Thursday, House of Commons Speaker Lindsay Hoyle announced they will indeed be moving forward with a plan for a virtual parliament. Initially this will cover ministers’ statements, and questions to ministers, and will be conducted over Zoom, with a small number of MPs still attending the House of Commons in person, while maintaining social distancing measures in the Chamber.
This is a great first step because as I have mentioned, it’s crucial that there is the opportunity to question the Government as we continue to respond to the Covid-19 crisis. In an email to MPs from the Speaker’s office, the current plan was described as “an achievable first step towards a virtual parliament – having the benefit of meeting current technological capacity”.
I sincerely hope that this “first step” message is accurate and that this plan will be expanded to allow other parts of Parliament to continue to function as this crisis continues.
I also hope very sincerely that when we are on the other end of this crisis that the work done here in allowing Parliament to modernise will not be discarded or undone.
It’s long past time that Westminster was reformed and, clearly, despite what the Government has said for years, it has always been possible to do so.
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