And still it gets worse
Friday, January 24, 2014
Gagging bill defeat: Britain's democracy just got worse - Index on Censorship | Index on Censorship.
What's the difference between lobbying and telling your elected (or would be elected) representatives what you want from them? Is it whether it's done well or badly? Or whether it costs money or not? It seems that politicians just don't want to be asked for pledges, so that those asking can't publicise their refusals, or - worse - their subsequent failures to honour their promises.
The political parties are losing members by the hour, but still they consider themselves the moral superiors of every other group in society. I certainly hold no brief for the politicised fake charities of Britain. I am all for holding the entire third sector to the original definition of charity in the Statute of Elizabeth and treating all who fail to meet that definition as the political parties in disguise that they are. Nor am I fond of 'single issue fanatic' groups, professional lobbyists or 'think tanks' that are fronts for political parties.
But it is not for politicians to tell us how or when to talk to them. It is for them to shut up and listen. They are servants, not masters and are getting entirely too uppity.
This is a bad law and another embarrassment to Britain in the world.
It is for them to shut up and listen.
They would beg leave to disagree.
Posted by: james higham | Monday, January 27, 2014 at 09:12 AM
"I certainly hold no brief for the politicised fake charities of Britain. I am all for holding the entire third sector to the original definition of charity in the Statute of Elizabeth and treating all who fail to meet that definition as the political parties in disguise that they are. Nor am I fond of 'single issue fanatic' groups, professional lobbyists or 'think tanks' that are fronts for political parties."
Because of that I was for this law but you and experience tells me that laws more often than not lead to very nasty unintended consequences. So I recant and accept that this is yet another bad law that should not see it's way onto the statute books where so many other bad ones now reside and thereby heap more misery on the benighted citizens of the UK.
Posted by: Antisthenes | Friday, January 24, 2014 at 06:12 PM