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October 30, 2007
Accountability's what we need
Andrew Gilligan's column in yesterday's Evening Standard made some very good points about the need to strengthen accountability of those in public life in order to regain people's confidence and participation in our democracy. He mentions electoral reform as part of that process. The key paragraphs are below:
"The crisis in our democracy will not be solved by allowing demonstrators back into Parliament Square, welcome as that is, or by anything else Gordon Brown suggested last week. It's a crisis of accountability. The reason why corruption or shamelessness goes so often unpunished, the reason why the undeserving are so often rewarded, is that power in Britain is too often unaccountable. Too often, the bodies scrutinising the Government are themselves appointed by the Government."
"We need select committees without a governing-party bias. We need democratic approval of senior appointments and salaries. We need a way of finding independent investigators in whom all can have confidence. We need electoral reform to bring all voters, and not just a few million in marginals, into the political process. We need to make sure that the greedy and the grasping in public life fear the real prospect of retribution, not just criticism."
Posted by malcolmclark on October 30, 2007
