Rise above it

For several weeks now, a group of anti-Brexit protesters have found a way of regularly appearing on television news. They wave banners and chant slogans and try to disturb politicians being interviewed. Most MPs take it in good part. Jacob Rees-Mogg even expressed his admiration for those able to shout ‘Stop Brexit’ in a way that is picked up by microphones a hundred yards away. But when pro-Brexit protesters called Anna Soubry a Nazi, dozens of MPs wrote to the police asking them to intervene. The police issued new guidelines to officers.

Broadcasters have been conducting interviews with politicians on the green outside parliament for decades. Protesters have rarely interfered. That they do so now on a daily basis is a reflection of the coarsening of political debate.

Seven years ago, John McDonnell was talking about the need to break from civility and revive the politics of protest. ‘I want to be in a situation,’ he said, ‘where no Tory MP, no coalition minister, can travel anywhere in the country or show their face anywhere in public without being challenged, without direct action.’