Thursday, February 5, 2015

The Future of Democracy Part I: Archaic Democracy.


Yesterday morning, I clicked on a link on Facebook to this article. It's a joke article, and a really funny one, poking fun at the way religion can stick it's nose into policy based on science, but the other way around is just not done, at least in the UK. As with all good jokes, it works well because it contains more than a grain of truth.

Lords Spiritual

The thing about this article that stuck with me after the laughing had died down was that it included a wikipedia link to the Lords Spiritual. I must admit, that as much as I am against the House of Lords in principal, it is not something I have researched much, not know much about, so when I read that 26 of it's sitting and voting members are made up of Bishops of the Anglican Church, to say I was gobsmacked is an understatement. I find this fact abhorrent, and counter to all modern democratic principles, even more so that the existence of the House of Lords to begin with.

Okay, so they are only 3.3% of the voting members of the House, (there are a further 5 former Lords Spiritual, who still sit in the House, due to life peerages so really it's 3.9%) but that is not the point . These are men (Women can be anglican bishops, but since the first one was only ordained last month, none of those sitting are female) have not been elected by the public (as all Peers), they have a very definite bias towards religion, thereby denying the division between church and state that I believe should be the cornerstone of all progresive societies. Furthermore, they are all Anglican. For historical reasons, and reasons of established religion, only English Bishops can sit. There is no representation from Scotland (Scottish Bishops were excluded from the Scottish parliament in 1638), Wales (the Church of Wales split in 1920, and the Welsh Bishops lost their seats) or Ireland (dissestablished in 1871). Not to mention people of other faiths within England and the rest of the UK. Only 19.9% of the population of the UK consider themselves members of the Church of England. This is not what we could call an equal representation of constituent states, is it? Don't get me wrong, I don't think the answer would be to install Bishops, or Bishops equivalents from the other member countries of the UK, but to dissestablish the Anglican Bishops sitting now.

The coalition Government slated reform to reduce this number, but these reforms have been dropped, due to lack of Tory support for the bill. Quelle surprise!

Canada

Yes, the House of Lords is an aberration, and one that seems particular to the UK, but a lot of the faults it has are mirrored in the Canadian Senate, another unelected body of power, granted with different selection criterea, but un democratic all the same. Especially since the numbers of Senators per Province are grossly out of date. The second issue, for both upper houses, is that they perpetuate the two party system. This is less so the case in the UK, which has Lords from many (but not all) parties, but even there, there is an inbuilt bias towards the two party system that cannot be easily eradicated. In Canada, it is much worse, with only two of the countries parties having seats (No NDP, Bloc or Green Senators). Last year, all Liberal Senators were removed from the Liberal Party, making them nominal Independant mambers, but the reality is, it seems more a PR stunt than actually making the senators functionally independant.

Reform

Democratic reform, is not a luxury, it is a neccesity. These Houses of sober reflection are undemocratic, and extremely out of date. It is also debateable if they actually do work as brakes on the Houses of Commons, since they can be filled by the Government of the day with their own people, thereby allowing laws to be passed anyway. These systems are centuries out of date, and don't fulfil the role intended of them, and in fact hinder modern democratic processes and full representation of the citizens of these countries. Is it no wonder then, that people are disengaging from politics under these systems, and are actively searching for alternatives?

I had intended to go on to look at some exciting developments and alternative democratic procedures, but I have ranted on for far too long, so that must now become a second post.

Edit:
Seems, the number of members is going up, at an astounding rate!
King Edward I presiding over his Parliament c.1300. The Lords Spiritual are assembled on the left (bishops and abbots dressed in red, priors in black) with Lords Temporal on the right. - See more at: http://holyredundant.org.uk/2012/06/26/test/edward-i-c-1300/#sthash.7TvRBdnj.dpuf
King Edward I presiding over his Parliament c.1300. The Lords Spiritual are assembled on the left (bishops and abbots dressed in red, priors in black) with Lords Temporal on the right. - See more at: http://holyredundant.org.uk/2012/06/26/test/edward-i-c-1300/#sthash.7TvRBdnj.dpuf
King Edward I presiding over his Parliament c.1300. The Lords Spiritual are assembled on the left (bishops and abbots dressed in red, priors in black) with Lords Temporal on the right. - See more at: http://holyredundant.org.uk/2012/06/26/test/edward-i-c-1300/#sthash.7TvRBdnj.dpuf

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