Why MPs Rally Round Westminster Bad Boys
02 Nov 2005
Evening Standard Because he is blind, it is safe to assume that David Blunkett is peculiarly sensitive to touch. When he woke up this morning he must have felt the cold fingers of political death on his shoulder.
Once upon a time, Cabinet ministers came and went at the behest of the prime minister. The most famous political axing of the late 20th century was Harold Macmillan's "Night of the Long Knives". He sacked seven ministers in an attempt to improve his personal popularity. As was said at the time "greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his friends for his life."
But the process that David Blunkett is going through,where a government minister is removed because of a relentless campaign played out in the media, is relatively new. Disclosure piles on disclosure, eating away at the unfortunate victim's political life-support systems like acid, until, all reputation eroded, they are removed. This is the result, partly of modern politics' obsession with the media, and partly of 24-hour news with its demand for a new sensation every 60 minutes.
I have seen this ritual disembowelling many times over. The public would be surprised to know that when some scandal emerges about an MP the first response of the rest of us is to rally around. Westminster is a village; none of us are angels, so when we read the ugly story in the News of the World, most of us think: "There but for the grace of God" So, in the House of Commons tea room MPs of all parties will shuffle up to the unfortunate one and say "sorry to hear about the boyfriend/ girlfriend/you having sex with a goat." The instinct to form a circle with the wagons is particularly powerful in the parliamentary Labour party when the victim is another Labour MP. What happens next depends partly on how genuinely popular the MP is. I sometimes think that, if it had been loveable Mo Mowlam rather than Peter Mandelson who got into a muddle about a mortgage, she would not have been made to resign. But events will also turn on whether the "scandal" is some random idiocy or points to a greater truth.
Poor John Major perfected a dismal cycle. First he would ask the MP if they had actually done anything wrong. They would invariable say no. Then Major would come out in support of his minister. Then there would be the excruciating photo-calls with the betrayed wife. But every day the media would pile on new "disclosures". Finally, there would be one news story too many (often something relatively trivial), something indefinable would change in the air of the Westminster village and the minister concerned would disappear through the trapdoor of political life.
David Blunkett is currently on political death row. A last minute reprieve is always possible. But when ministers start insisting that they are not going to resign, it is actually a sure sign that they are going to have to.
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