Four years after promising a recall system for MPs, the coalition has delivered on its promise in today’s Queen Speech. Or has it? The Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith doesn’t think so. The long-time campaigner for a proper recall bill believes that the proposals announced today are a ‘pretence’. On this week’s View from 22 podcast, Goldsmith reveals why he doesn’t believe the recall announced is really a recall:
‘Under the government’s proposals, there isn’t a recall referendum…effectively the [Parliamentary Standards] committee decides an MP qualifies for recall, they’re finished. That’s it. It’s all power to the committee, all to the institution and no to the voters’
Goldsmith also thinks that the criteria is so narrow — essentially for ‘serious financial wrongdoing’ — that few misbehaving MPs will qualify for recall. Instead of putting trust back into politics, he believes it will make things worse:
‘The danger is that the very next scandal, voters will realise they’ve been duped.
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