The word of the day is ...

"Redacted". It is everywhere today due to the 'publication' of the last four year's worth of MPs' receipted expenditure. I looked at the information for my own MP — Glenda Jackson — and found great big expanses of black where details had been 'redacted'. 'Removed to hide the real information' more like! Thank you to the editor of The Telegraph for publishing the unexpurgated version so that we may see what the MPs were trying to hide. Clearly, whilst our Members of Parliament may wish to not have certain details easily available to the public (even though they are legally required to publish most of these same details elsewhere!) the fact that addresses — even 'loose' ones such as just the town or outbound postcode — are omitted from these records released today means that it would be nigh on impossible to show just how unacceptable some of them have been with taxpayers money.

Re-shuffle?

Surely, to be a reshuffle one must randomise the pack somewhat? I'd always understood that to be the meaning of the word. Anyway, leaving over half of your cabinet in the exact same positions as they were the day before can hardly be called a change, can it. Alistair Darling — stays as Chancellor
David Miliband — stays as Foreign Secretary
Jack Straw — stays as Justice Minister
Lord Mandelson — stays at Business
Ed Balls — stays at Schools
Ed Miliband — keeps with Climate
Shaun Woodward — remains at Northern Ireland
Jim Murphy — stays with Scotland

Brown's Mandate

Repeatedly one hears political commentators exclaiming that Gordon Brown has "no mandate" to be the Prime Minister given that he wasn't the leader of his party at the time of the General Election. A few moments ago William Hague said it again on a television interview on the BBC. Every time I hear this I want to scream out that people should really learn about the form of electoral democracy we have in this country. Unlike the USA or France, for example, we do not directly elect our political leader. We have representational democracy where each constituency elects a representative to the national parliament at Westminster. It is they who appoint a Prime Minister from amongst their number; usually the leader of the largest party. If that individual resigns — like Harold Wilson — or is removed by their colleagues — like Margaret Thatcher — their replacement needs no "new mandate from the country" as they were never elected by 'the country'. The only people who elect the PM are, in one sense, the electorate of their constituency which elected them to Parliament in the first place! Major, Callaghan, and Brown took over as PM by virtue of our political system and had every right to continue in post without 'getting permission' from anyone else, least of all a General election. And being the leader of one's party at the time of an election doesn't always mean getting the top the next day either. The former Greater London Council was a body elected in a similar manner to Westminster on the opposite side of the Thames, yet in the election on 7 May 1981 — which Labour, under the leadership of Andrew McIntosh narrowly won — saw the coming to power of Ken Livingstone as he challenged and beat McIntosh for the leadership the following day! So, whether we like the understudy taking the top job or not, they have the right, and duty, to do that job. Our system precludes any other option.