The New Term at St Stephens!

Regrettably many MP's still talk like public school boys of the new term as if they were coming back to boarding school whenever Parliament begins a new session. Wednesday 15th of November saw the State Opening of Parliament and the Queens Speech (written of course by the Prime Minister), telling us what the Government plans to do for the next year. This is a 'top secret' document until read out by the Monarch- the details of which you could read in that mornings papers because Government spin doctors had been hard at work with journalists the night before!

The State Opening is full of pomp and circumstance. The Queen is preceded into the House of Lords by the 'Cap of Maintenance', the Rouge Dragon Pursuivant, Fitzalan Pursuivant Extraordinary, Maltravers Herald Extraordinary , the Woman of the Bedchamber, Gold Stick in Waiting and many others. Of course some things have changed since the Middle Ages, after all Silver Stick in Waiting was retired in 1998.

Behind all this historical pageantry however there is significant symbolism too. When the 'Gentleman Usher of Black Rod' marches the length of the building to summon the 'Commoners' to hear the Queens Speech in the Lords, the door of the House of Commons is slammed in his face. This symbolises the barricading of the Commons against Charles 1st when he came to arrest 5 MP's in 1642 an event that began the English Civil War and so established that the Monarch was not an absolute dictator.

What of the speech itself? The swan song of an exhausted and discredited Prime Minister. More promises of legislation .More Acts on Education, Terrorism, Law and Order on top of the masses of laws already passed to little effect. Yet another Criminal Justice Bill when 50 sections of the 2003 Criminal Justice Act have never been passed into law and some sections have been repealed BEFORE they ever even passed into law!

The speech was strong on promises of law making but weak on promises of action. Ten years on we still have one of the worst state pensions in Western Europe and a failed Child Support Agency. There was no hope for Derbyshire's under funded police force, no help for today's pensioners living below the poverty line, no support for public transport, no fair treatment for Chesterfield's Council Tenants, no effective action on Climate Change - just more warm words and distant targets to do something by 2050.