Parliamentary Democracy in the United Kingdom

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Tuesday 25th April 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, after 44 years in Westminster, do I believe that UK parliamentary democracy has been strengthened? On the contrary: I believe it has been weakened. What is my measure? General election turnouts, which are a good measure of confidence. The turnout was 77% in 1992 and 67% in the last election. Why the 10% decline?

There are two explanations: the conduct of a few in Westminster’s political class; and the internet, which has hugely increased transparency across the political divide. What has it revealed? First, a breakdown in our criminal justice system, with escalating street and online crime, to which the Government’s response is just more cuts. Secondly, the shift in policy towards the personal funding of hitherto public service provision, breeding inequality while penalising the poor. Thirdly, the state’s ruthless indifference to the scandal of housing policy, which through managed scarcity enriches property owners and exploits those who rent. Finally, government indifference to the income greed of a few, whose settlements insult the intelligence of a hard-working majority living in the real world of deprivation and struggling to survive.

It is against that background that the public increasingly shun the polling booth. I predict that when the scandalous gerrymandering of the electoral system through individual registration is fully exposed, there will be an angry outcry from an alienated, disfranchised public.