Sanity in the UK?

[unixronin]

(to the tune, naturally, of the Sex Pistols)

The BBC reports that new British Deputy PM Nick Clegg promises "the biggest political reforms since 1832".  The reforms promised by the Convervative/Liberal Democrat coalition would include, but not be limited to, making the House of Lords an elected body with proportional representation (brilliant move!), giving voters the power to recall an unsatisfactory MP, imposing a fixed five-year limit on the tenure of any government (but keeping the ability of Parliament to force early dissolution of a government by a vote of no confidence), scrapping the "contact point" database that currently registers over 11 million minors, scrapping the national ID card and biometric passports, "properly regulating" CCTV use (well, it's a start, I suppose), repealing many of the control-freak laws enacted by the last two Labour governments, and introducing a mechanism to block the creation of "pointless new criminal offenses". In perhaps the most dramatic move of all, Clegg even proposes giving the public the power to go through the statute books and nominate excessive or unfair laws to be repealed.

Two hundred and thirty four years.  I guess it's about time for another bold experiment in democracy.  This just could be it.  There would be an amusing irony if it turned out to be the turn of the British to tire of their shackles and throw off an oppressive government.

Comments

[ithildae]

I hope it works! I hope we can copy their results!

[hugh_mannity]

If he manages it, I'd consider moving back there. :D

[polaris93.livejournal.com]

Wow! Now, let's see if they actually go through with this. It's horrible seeing the Nanny State that the UK has turned into, and time they ditched it. But bad politics are like bad money: bad drives out good, and good rarely comes back. So I'll wait on the evidence.

[hrrunka]

I really hope they'll manage to pull at least some of those off. The "pointless new criminal offences" one's particularly interesting, as it'd put a check on most of the knee-jerk public-outcry (or tabloid-press-outcry) stuff.

[wyrdling.livejournal.com]

yeh... me too on the "let's see how much they can actually accomplish" chorus. but, well, if they do, maybe that would help some of the waves here start moving towards common sense, as well...