News from the New Party

A danger to democracy

Steve Richards in the Independent explains why the Davis by-election campaign is a danger to democracy rather than a celebration of it:

If they have any choice in the matter, a referendum is a device proposed by leaders only when they are certain they can win. Conversely, it is used by voters to cast their verdict on a variety of subjects often unrelated to the single issue they are supposed to be voting on. Referendum campaigns are fuelled by hysteria whipped up in order to create an atmosphere of fear.

Similarly, single-issue by-elections are a distortion, the crusading candidate implying that one policy can be plucked out of the air and made the subject of excessive and simplistic attention, when any national leader must address the subtleties of the relevant single issue and give more prominence to other policy areas.

With Mr Davis, the situation is more confused. If he were to hold an Irish-style national referendum on his opposition to detaining suspects for longer, he would lose. Voters approve of him for different, and more dangerous, reasons, because he sticks two fingers up at orthodox democratic politics...

If every MP were to be equally self-indulgent [as David Davis], democratic politics would be unworkable in Britain too. Cleverly, Mr Davis portrays his move as one that chimes with voters compared with the timid, insular preoccupations of the "Westminster village", always a location viewed with a lazy disdain.

In doing so, he fuels the stupid and dangerous "plague on all their houses" culture. Politics is a tough old business. It is about the resolution of disagreement through debate, manoeuvring, winning votes in parliament, persuading voters and the media to come on board. This may not sound especially romantic, but the alternative to resolution of dispute through politics is the use of force. Politics is better.

The reason we have parliament - the reason we have politics - is because representative democracy generally works and direct democracy generally doesn't.  Democracy cannot be reduced to a series of yes/no answers, and by pretending otherwise the Davis campaign is doing a disservice to democracy.  The parliamentary vote on 42 days detention without charge was shamefully manipulated by the government for base political reasons which had precious little to do with the merits of the case.  David Davis has rightly lambasted the decision and in particular the manner in which it was taken.  However, by imposing a by-election on the voters in his constituency, and launching a bogus referendum offering false choices, David Davis is no less guilty of manipulating the democratic process than Gordon Brown. 

The people of Haltemprice and Howden deserve better.

Britain deserves better.