Democratic Institutions: Threats

Lord Jackson of Peterborough Excerpts

Thursday 25th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to have the opportunity to take part in this excellent debate, and I commend the noble Lord Wallace. I even agreed with the first two or three minutes of his speech.

I do not suppose many in your Lordships’ House have read the Pope’s magisterial first encyclical letter, Magnifica Humanitas, published on 25 May, but it touches on some of the issues raised in today’s debate. The letter focuses on human dignity in the age of AI. Pope Leo XIV references “disinformation”, which he describes as the “manipulation of information”. His central thesis is that, despite the power of technology, which he calls the “culture of power”, it is possible to preserve humanity through “truth, work and freedom”. Human beings are quite capable of avoiding seeing themselves as projects to be optimised or commodified, rather than valuing themselves and others with inherent humanity and dignity. In short, we must and we can trust the interested electorate to have the common sense they were born with.

It is in that wider context that we should critique calls by liberals, authoritarians, humanists and others to mediate and modulate political, social and cultural discourse online, supposedly for the common good. That reduces consumers of social media platforms, despite historically high levels of information, as my noble friend Lord Howell said, to the status of helpless supplicants needing the paternalistic protections of their social and cultural superiors to adjudicate the new platforms and contentious and challenging ideas that are considered heretical—odd, really, as the liberal mindset usually extols the virtues of radical personal autonomy.

If we assume that social media platforms are to be literally policed, the question is, “Cui bono?”—for whose advantage? A narrative that promulgates the idea that some concepts are beyond the pale self-evidently favours the establishment, its collective views, culture, power and infrastructure. “Populist” is used as a pejorative term by elites to invalidate and negate the views of others, challenging their power structures and policies. An example has been given: the whole narrative of disinformation around Brexit was built up in 2016 by its opponents when, fundamentally, the failure to make an alternative, positive and compelling case for the EU was much more likely as a causal factor.

We risk creating a gatekeeping oligopoly of big government, big tech and the permanent state. Social media, of course, is different now from previous media as a platform for political debate. Britain has a long history of ribald, raucous, robust, dishonest and exaggerated debates and elections. The public have never not been cynical about their political leaders. It is why hundreds of people stood on Lambeth embankment and cheered on the blaze that devoured the Palace of Westminster in October 1834; they did not check with X before they did it. Partisan newspapers, rowdy public meetings, the coruscating cartoons of Gillray, Low and Steve Bell, party-political broadcasts: they are all part of our rumbustious political heritage. Do voters today need extra-special protection? Do they need safe spaces? Do they lack the critical faculties of their forebears who were less well-educated, less well-travelled and cultured? Of course not.

There is little or no evidence of a substantial threat to democracy. This debate, frankly, is a diversion and a displacement exercise for the underlying failures of British government and politics. I have read the Rycroft review and I worked with Philip Rycroft at DExEU. He is right to highlight the collapse in public trust, but your Lordships’ House would be wrong to confuse causation with correlation. Social media reflects Britain’s cynicism and profound unhappiness with a failed economic, political and demographic model: overcentralisation; Treasury dominance; unsustainable debt; failing public services; rising unemployment; spiralling taxes, business rates, regulation and bureaucracy; ossified social mobility; stagnant real wages; and betrayal of the social contract by politicians who lie to get elected and then renege on their promises. We have an activist, unaccountable judiciary and a quango state that thwarts organisational change, intercedes between electors and Ministers, and stifles innovation. We also have two-tier policing, rampant welfare spending and the deification of woke shibboleths, fads and obsessions, such as DEI and net zero and, of course, endemic regional economic disparities.

What really is a threat to democracy? I will give three examples. The first is trade union legislation that is written by trade unions for trade unions. That is a threat to democracy and undermines faith and trust in our system. The second is the shadowy research, information and communication unit in the Home Office—mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley—coaching, manipulating and threatening bereaved families to stay on message in the media. The third is the stigmatising and criminalising of Christians who have sincere opposition to abortion—for “silent prayer”, read “thought crime”. This was contained in the Public Order Act 2023, shamefully under a so-called Conservative Government.

Railing against Elon Musk and X is otiose and pointless. Social media will continue to be febrile, fractious and angry until the establishment elite in this country focuses not on the messenger but on the message. Of course, I concede that there are bad actors that externally, from abroad, seek to interfere in our elections; it would be naive to think otherwise. But the seeds of discord, atomisation and civil disorder have already been sown by neglect and short-termist policies from a plutocratic elite. In conclusion, it will take a new generation of leaders and a new Government to address the societal ailments and afflictions which are very much closer to home.