I have often wondered what would happen if politicians were bound by the same rules as advertisers, or if manifestos were brought within the scope of the trading standards laws. What if we could take legal action against a government for failing to provide the extra NHS beds or school places they had promised?
Given the propensity for governments to excuse themselves from their own legislation when it suits them – Blair’s government simply passed a clause excluding political parties when Labour’s women-only shortlists fell foul of sex discrimination legislation – it is hard to imagine such a law being passed by Parliament.
But on 14th May, Westminster Magistrates heard an attempt to create one through political precedent. The court considered a case brought by a private prosecutor Marcus Ball, and crowdfunded through £370,000 of donations, to try to prosecute Boris Johnson for misconduct in public office on the basis that he allegedly made statements he knew to be false during the Brexit referendum campaign – in particular the old chestnut about Britain sending £350 million a week to the EU.
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