Sedgemore? Hardcore!

Three cheers for Brian Sedge­more, MP, one-​time Pri­vate Eye hack and former PPS to Tony Benn. Taking the oppor­tu­nity to let fly in his last speech to the House, during a debate on the ter­ri­fy­ing Pre­ven­tion of Ter­ror­ism Bill, he said this:

As this will almost cer­tainly be my last speech in Par­lia­ment, I shall try hard not to upset anyone. How­ever, our debate here tonight is a grim reminder of how the Prime Min­is­ter and the Home Sec­re­tary are betray­ing some of Labour’s most cher­ished beliefs. Not con­tent with toss­ing aside the ideas and ideals that inspire and inform ide­ol­ogy, they seem to be giving up on values too. Lib­erty, with­out which democ­racy has no mean­ing, and the rule of law, with­out which state power cannot be con­tained, look to Par­lia­ment for their pro­tec­tion, but this Par­lia­ment, sad to say, is fail­ing the nation badly. It is not just the Gov­ern­ment but Back-​Bench Mem­bers who are to blame. It seems that in sit­u­a­tions such as this, pol­i­tics become incom­pat­i­ble with con­science, prin­ci­ple, decency and self-​respect. Regret­tably, in such sit­u­a­tions, the desire for power and posi­tion predominates.

As we move towards a system of jus­tice that found favour with the South African Gov­ern­ment at the time of apartheid and which par­al­lels Burmese jus­tice today, if hon. Mem­bers will pardon the oxy­moron, I am reminded that our fathers fought and died for lib­erty—my own father lit­er­ally—believ­ing that these things should not happen here, and we would never allow them to happen here. But now we know better. The unthink­able, the unimag­in­able, is hap­pen­ing here.

And then, a little later, he said this:

Have we all, indi­vid­u­ally and col­lec­tively, no shame? I sup­pose that once one has shown con­tempt for lib­erty by voting against it in the Lobby, it becomes easier to do it a second time and after that, a third time. Thus even Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment who claim to believe in human rights vote to destroy them.

Many Mem­bers have gone nap on the matter. They voted: first, to abol­ish trial by jury in less seri­ous cases; sec­ondly, to abol­ish trial by jury in more seri­ous cases; thirdly, to approve an unlaw­ful war; fourthly, to create a gulag at Bel­marsh; and fifthly, to lock up inno­cent people in their homes. It is truly ter­ri­fy­ing to imag­ine what those Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment will vote for next.I can describe all that only as new Labour’s descent into hell, which is not a place where I want to be.

I hope that—-but doubt whether—-ethical prin­ci­ples and lib­eral thought will tri­umph tonight over the lazy minds and dis­en­gaged con­sciences that make Labour’s Whips Office look so ridicu­lous and our Par­lia­ment so unprincipled.

It is a foul calumny that we do today. Not since the Act of Set­tle­ment 1701 has Par­lia­ment usurped the powers of the judi­ciary and allowed the Exec­u­tive to lock up people with­out trial in times of peace. May the Gov­ern­ment be damned for it.

One in the eye for the gov­ern­ment, and proof that the days of pas­sion­ate, beau­ti­ful rhetoric in Par­lia­ment are not quite over.

(Via Ben Ham­mer­sly)

Posted at 10am on 26/02/05 by Jack Mottram to the politics category.
Permalink · Add to del.icio.us
Tags: politics