In private moments of exasperation with rebellious Tory MPs, prime minister David Cameron used to complain that “too many of my colleagues think they’re here as tribunes of the people”. For him, as for Conservatives since the days of Edmund Burke, MPs should be representatives autonomously exercising judgment, not delegates meekly obeying instructions.
Well congratulations Dave. Thanks to your brilliant decision to risk EU membership – and the entire British political settlement on a coin-toss, MPs are all tribunes now.
There are some serious caveats about the ComRes poll on the front of the Daily Telegraph today: the question looks loaded and the “don’t know” figure is very high. But the fact that proroguing Parliament to let the executive have its way over Brexit isn’t simply rejected out of hand is another sign of how the referendum has eroded the conventions that underpin our constitution.
For all the reasonable criticisms of that poll, it is hard to deny that a non-trivial number of people would now be quite content if Parliament was set aside to deny MPs a say on the form and fact of our EU exit. (For a more balanced poll, see this by YouGov.
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