Is This Parliament The Worst Ever?

[sp1814]

If so - how have we got here?

If not - why?

So many times I've turned on the evening news and thought, "So who's been caught out in a scandal?" (lobbying, bullying, corruption), or "whose been suspended as a sex pest?" (take your pick)

Summarised here it genuinely looks like we've got the worst parliament ever

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/30/is-this-parliament-worst-ever-westminster-badly-needs-reform

Is this overblown or have we finally reached the bottom of the Westminster barrel?

[Untitled]

until quite recently both main parties could reasonably be called "broad churches" with a degree of diversity within them...

after brexit and especially under johnson the conservatives have ruthlessly purged the party of quite frankly anyone with a brain or a set of coherent convictions... the result is that the party now consists entirely of amoral cynics who try desperately to latch on to whatever horrid neurosis is presently occupying their supporters

labour has purged itself of anyone to the left of tony blair (and some even to the right of him!) ever since starmer became leader... the result is a party that is bland and rather toothless... and unnervingly willing to turn their backs on vulnerable minorities

a lot of this comes down to our stupid and antiquated voting system.. it guarantees that either labour or tory will dominate so if you want to exclude someone from politics you just kick them out and send them to the wilderness. they are both complacent and reluctant to change the electoral system because it gives the two of them
all the power

a proportional system would introduce new problems and certainly would not get rid of corruption... but it would certainly allow more serious people with real ideas and convictions to have a bite at the cherry... and that is something we desperately need!!!

[vulcan42]

It can be summed up very easily, we can only vote for the people who stand for election and they are the very people who shouldn't be in politics. This will never happen but perhaps the only way for things to change is at the next election nobody voted.