Jon Snow
Tough times at the trough
Jon Snow blogs on the aftermath of the expense scandal and the call for real reform in the Houses of power.
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Jon Snow
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Gary Gibbon
It’s not only MPs who are arguing over Commons expenses
Gary Gibbon blogs on the clash of views on MPs expenses between Sir Thomas Legg and Sir Paul Kennedy, and why not all the money will be paid back to the Commons.
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Gary Gibbon
Gordon Brown has pressed the button
Gordon Brown has pressed the button and changed British electioneering forever. In a statement on the Labour website he’s given the go-ahead for head-to-head debates between the party leaders to start before the campaign proper, to be in a series – maybe three, maybe more and to take place round the country.
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Jon Snow
The Commons: little prospect of reform?
I had to go down to the Commons yesterday to interview David Miliband. The Foreign Secretary was stranded in his office, held up by the election of the Speaker. I am blessed with a Commons pass – largely so that I can evade the bolt cutters of the Metropolitan police and park my bike on…
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Jon Snow
My FOI request on the FSA threw up SFA
I am at the apparent end of a tussle with the Financial Services Authority (FSA). Or I think I am. Last month it was revealed that 51 individuals had effectively failed to pass muster as “competent” to hold key positions in Britain’s financial services industry. Or to put it more politely, these individuals had “withdrawn”…
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Jon Snow
The new Speaker must drop this flummery
On one level he is the fall guy of the expenses scandal. But on another, some see Michael Martin as the agent of his own undoing. Look no further than the absurd scenes enacted yesterday as he processed through the Palace of Westminster. Did anyone ever think of cutting that frock coat so that some…
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Gary Gibbon
Will ‘stopping Bercow’ win it for Beckett?
There is a growing feeling that the “Stop Bercow” campaign will win the day on Monday. The sense is that John Bercow might very well top the ballot on the first round of the Speakership contest but then not pile on many votes. Sir George Young and Margaret Beckett could be vying for second place.…
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Gary Gibbon
Speaking out: a parting swipe
“I didn’t realise how much you liked me so I’ve decided I’m staying.” The Speaker’s words at the end of a nearly two hours of tributes. But he was only joking.
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Gary Gibbon
Will Eton win the Speaker election?
The Speaker election on Monday could be a very drawn out process. It all depends how many potential candidates get enough nominations to become full candidates by Monday at 10.30am.
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Gary Gibbon
Hustings headlines
Latest update from the Speaker hustings where potential candidates for the job are speaking.
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Jon Snow
Constitutional reform: questions for Mr Brown
Gordon Brown will signal today whether the political classes “get it” when it comes to combating the expenses scandal in parliament. “Getting it” extends well beyond expenses to full-blown reform of our system of governance, as I have written here before.
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Jon Snow
Boris's bike escape shows what cyclists put up with
Boris Johnson’s brush with a near-death accident on his bike in London’s Limehouse district (see video below) throws into sharp relief the experience we cyclists endure every working day. I am, like Boris, a jobbing cyclist. I use the machine every working day of my life – to, from, and at work. Several times a…
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Jon Snow
Our love of hierarchy means little will change
I first set eyes on Gordon Brown at Edinburgh University in 1970. We were both involved in student protests in our respective universities and I’d been invited from Liverpool University to give a talk to him and his fellow protesters on the campus in Edinburgh.
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Jon Snow
Why were Tony Blair's expenses shredded?
There has still been no explanation forthcoming as to why, amid all the other expenses details to have emerged from the Commons, only one named MP’s expenses seem to have been shredded. It has been reported that other MPs’ expenses were also shredded. But I can only find the name of one MP to whom…
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Jon Snow
Lords' expenses: it's a wonderful life
I am reliably informed that when new peers arrive in the House of Lords, there is a kind of informal induction process. Baroness Helena Kennedy of The Shaws tells me that when she arrived in the house, a peer came up to her and almost immediately opened the question of “second homes”.