Democratic Institutions: Threats

Lord Norton of Louth Excerpts

Thursday 25th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Norton of Louth (Con)]

My Lords, I too commend the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, for securing this debate. I also commend the Library briefing prepared for it.

I wish to make one key point. Committing legal and electronic resources to tackling disinformation is necessary, but it is not sufficient to bolster trust in our political system. As has been mentioned, disinformation is exacerbating popular distrust, but it is not the cause of it. Countering disinformation is essentially a reactive process, but we need to be proactive if we are to build popular trust. Those who peddle disinformation exploit a lack of understanding of our political system—not only of how it operates but of the benefits it delivers to citizens. We have a political system characterised by accountability, effectiveness, flexibility and coherence. Yet, as has been mentioned, trust is low both in absolute terms and in international comparison. People do not trust either House of Parliament, the Executive or, especially, political parties.

The noble Lord, Lord Cryer, referred to the “good chaps” theory of government. Our system of government derives its strength not from an elite of good chaps but from everyone being good chaps. Core to political stability is having a culture of constitutionalism. We tend to focus on form, but it is values that matter. There are changes that can and should be made to how our politics operate, both at the level of the individual politician, through a tightening of standards, and systemically in terms of how political parties operate. But what matters most in terms of trust is enabling people to feel that they have some involvement.

A necessary starting point is embedding citizenship in our educational system. That is the route to building an informed electorate, and indeed the route to ensuring that citizens appreciate voting and have an incentive to vote. We had a debate in this House in 2018 on citizenship and civic engagement in which I spoke, as did the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire. I quoted the research of James Weinberg of the University of Sheffield, who said:

“We have evidence … that citizenship education, where it is done effectively and consistently, can predict political efficacy, participation and levels of knowledge”.


Yet we have still not grasped the sheer importance of producing a politically literate population. Citizenship is formally part of the curriculum, but schools do not have the capacity to teach it effectively and lack the incentive to commit resources to it. Fewer than 5% of pupils opt for GCSE citizenship studies. If citizenship contributed to league tables, schools would take it seriously. There are not enough trained citizenship teachers. The recent Curriculum and Assessment Review emphasised the importance of enhancing media literacy, as well as knowledge of democracy and government, through citizenship teaching. It recommended that citizenship become statutory from key stage 1.

Ensuring that we have the resources to tackle disinformation is crucial, but so too is building a politically informed citizenry. The two should be seen as inextricably linked. Treating citizenship as a silo in the Department for Education is unwittingly to assist those who spread disinformation. A more politically savvy population would be better able to spot disinformation. As it is, and as we have heard, people are too susceptible to claims posted online. Enhancing citizenship education is not part of the Rycroft recommendations, but it is a logical extension of what is proposed. It should be core to the work of the Government’s Defending Democracy Taskforce. Building an informed and supportive body of citizens, especially young citizens, is a way of erecting a powerful barrier against those who would seek to undermine our democracy. The barriers need to be human, not simply legal and electronic.