Right, here we go; the right of parliamentary privilege has it's roots in the bill of rights 1689 (or possibly 1688, dependent on what you class to be the original document), pictured is a copy of that document (courtesy of the national archive).
Obviously as you can see, this is a somewhat dated document in it's physical form, and in some ways is also dated in it's relevance to todays society and relationship between monarchy and parliament.
In it's day this was a very important piece of legislation, it allowed the formation of government without influence of the monarch, although I'm not sure why the potential PM has to let the queen know when they are planning on forming a government, probably some other equally outdated nonsense based more in tradition than practicality and purpose. Anyway back to the point......
This Bill of Rights contains the basic premise for setting up a government of the people rather than a feudal government based on family heritage and land ownership, I know, I know, we seem to have ignored the basic premise of this in recent times, but anyway, it was a good document in it's day, there is no doubt about that.
Aside from preventing any person from maintaining a standing army during peace times, and the right to bear arms (but only those which are suitable to our class), this was to stop the interference of government by the monarchy or feudal title holders, I know, another little discrepancy in modern times. Included in this original was the proclamation that "the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned by any court or place out of Parliament", and this has pretty much remained in place to this day, under the guise of "Parliamentary privilege".
Here's the modern version, (although not too modern mind):
It seems like the tables at some point must have turned though, because whereas the original intention was to prevent the interference of the government, comprised of the people, from the ruling classes, it appears that it now prevents the interference of the government, comprised of the ruling classes, from the people.
It should also be noted that the "court" referred to in the original document bears little resemblance to the courts of today, the courts that the people's parliamentarians wanted protection from were controlled and presided over by representatives of either the Church, the ruling Monarch, or both. So the protection of free speech was there in order to maintain a free and fair representation of the people not impinged by the interests of the ruler or the bishops in office at the time.
You see, from my view, the idea of parliamentary privilege was originally put in place as a stick with which to defend ourselves from our oppressors, it now appears to have become a stick with which our oppressors can beat us with in order to protect their own interests. It is obviously debateable as to whether the government has ever been a true government of the people, but it has become more apparent of late that even if it was at some point, it definitely isn't now, and by allowing the protections intended for us to be abused by our MPs in order to further their own agendas and to attempt to circumvent the laws that we all, as people, should be bound by, these people are doing neither us nor themselves any favours.
The recent abuses of privilege, like my own experiences of Tim Loughton exploiting it in order to throw a huge wobbler and get his lies published in the tabloids without any form of legal recourse available to challenge this slander and libel and the choice of MPs to expose footballers that have been playing away a little too often, is frankly a pathetic exploitation of a very noble intention laid down by their forbears in order to prevent them from being controlled by outside forces, sadly the current crop of MPs seem to be more intent on controlling us after the gradual creation of an intermediary ruling class of their own which appears to have overtaken the excesses of the previous Crown, Church, or feudal systems that they were put in place to ensure were governed by the people.
It is through these selfish and irresponsible actions and others like them, that the people of this country now hold their parliamentarians in contempt and feel that they do not represent the true feelings of the people and why the majority of people don't even bother to get involved with the 4/5 yearly pantomime of putting a cross on a piece of paper, anymore.
Parliament can work, and the privilege of free speech can be a positive thing, however with the kind of idiot that we have representing us, (well they pretend to represent us, but we all know who they really represent) it will never work and all the time that privileges are abused they become nothing more than symbols of hate rather than the symbol of responsibility that they were intended to be.
Anyway, there you go, a sensible post with very little swearing (can't remember if I did or not) and a serious message that there can be hope in parliament, but only if the people elected to it aren't hopeless.
TTFO
K
