Broon up to his usual tricks, trying to fix the speaker vote

Posted: Mon 22 Jun 2009 8 11 am

Gordon Brown was embroiled in a damaging row over the election of a new Commons speaker after MPs claimed that Labour whips were secretly attempting to swing the contest in favour of his Governmentâ€™s preferred candidate, Margaret Beckett.

Senior Labour MPs said they were being put under pressure to endorse Mrs Beckett, the former foreign secretary, in todayâ€™s secret ballot to chose a successor to Michael Martin.

On Sunday night Mrs Beckett was the bookmakersâ€™ favourite for the post.

The role of Speaker is supposed to be politically impartial with the office-holder commanding the respect of the whole of Parliament. Mr Martin was widely criticised for being partisan and there are growing fears over the independence of Mrs Beckett, who only left the Government earlier this month.

Convention suggests that the whips should not be involved in what is supposed to be a non-partisan contest and their secretive role is angering many MPs.

snip

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/5596840/Brown-in-row-over-secret-bid-to-install-Beckett-as-Speaker.html

Joined: 03 Aug 2006 Posts: 809

A disgraced government attempting to position a disgraced ex-Minister into a position of power within a disgraced Parliament.

Meanwhile, the people would prefer that there be a general election so that we can decide for ourselves.

All honourable MPs should resign their seats and put themselves up for re-election, forcing the dissolusion of Parliament.

Should I hold my breath?

Posted: Mon 22 Jun 2009 12 48 pm

Highlander wrote:

Should I hold my breath?

Not unless you want to go blue

Posted: Mon 22 Jun 2009 1 19 pm

But you might care to swing by the eyebrows, Highlander ...

The Darling eyebrows of the Chancellor, of course! Laughing