… generally implemented because “it’s unparliamentary to finger point” but occasionally activated by the Speaker if someone has thrown the Mace around…
...and I had a flashback to the great sending outs of the past. There was a time when “doing a standing order 43*” seemed to be a thing that happened weekly. Chief deliberate rule breaker was Dennis Skinner …
...these days no one – or almost no one – seems to be as naughty.
So I did some research into whether MPs had been more raucous in the past. It seems they indeed had been.
Between 1980 and 1989
there were 16 “namings” of MPs “suspended for the rest of the day”.
The only people “named” during the Blair/Brown years were the Reverand Ian Paisley, record holder Dennis Skinner (3 times) ,George Galloway and John McDonnell and the new Conservative governments have been similarly uneventful to cognoscentis of the naming ceremonies…
Between 1990 and
2021 there were only 8 “namings” – and 2 of those were Dennis Skinner.
Perhaps before Parliament was televised it was regarded as a sure fire way to get noticed or an issue talked about on the News and we have television to thank for the increase in decorum…
...or perhaps the number of “namings” is
driven by the level of political polarisation or the professionalization of the
body politic...
..or perhaps TV makes MPs less naughty. Anyway...
...for a moment let us reflect and remember the 80s ...
...when getting thrown out of the chamber was de-rigour…
*or 42 when there were less standing orders.
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