>>90138
Of all the stupid things Boris has done, this is the stupidest.

>>90138
And a few labour rebels who supported brexit of course.

Also, why is Boris with a Gerry Anderson puppet in that photo?

>>90138

Rather ironic given that he owns the Independent, a staunchly pro-EU online paper which skewers BoJo and his government at every opportunity. If Boris is fishing for better coverage there are less obvious ways of going about it.

>>90148
Yeah but he also owns the Evening Standard, gave Gideon Osborne a job as editor, who then used it as a mouthpiece to constantly snipe at Theresa May. I imagine that is part of the calculation as to why he got the gong.

>>90150
I don't imagine it'll get much traction (surprise surprise) but I do think there ought to be a law stopping one individual from owning multiple news outlets.

>>90151
Here's the problem: define "news outlet".

>>90151

Source of news with a specific, identifying brand name.

So you can own the Mirror Newspaper, youtube channel, TV channel, radio statio, whatever, but not also the Sun.

>How much does a peerage go for these days?

Few million in a donation to the Conservative Party. Or Labour if they're in power. Is this your first encounter with the gongs?

Let's all take a moment to think about how poor Bercow must feel.

>>90155
Whatever you think of him (I think he's a bit of a cock, but still a fine Speaker), it just comes across as spiteful.

>>90156

Yeah, it's hard not to see that as "fuck you for giving us a hard time when we were trying to blatantly do something illegal you big grass".

>>90156
>>90157
I imagine it's the bullying of his staff and turning blind eye to it happening more generally that tipped the scale. Politics certainly had something to do with it but it's not wise to be an arsehole without friends in high places.

>>90158

Mistress Patel has been accused of much the same, so I don't really think that has much to do with it.

>>90158
You think the speaker of the house doesn't count as having friends in high places?

>>90160
Well none where it counts in this instance.

>>90159
She was also sacked for conducting parallel diplomacy and made her way back into government thanks to friends in high-places. Shall I explain it a third time?

>>90160
Not for Bercow, no. Clearly not.

>>90162

So really it's a case of having the wrong friends in high places. His alleged bullying had nothing to do with it, just the fact he was from the other team.

>>90163
He's actually a Tory pick you silly goose. If we're talking about EU Exit then on principle he had no team.

>His alleged bullying had nothing to do with it

Yes it does. If he hadn't been a twat then the outcry would go beyond die-hard remainers trying to make a point.

>>90164

He supported remain. His actions as speaker were commonly interpreted as being intentionally obstructive because of his position on the matter.

Doesn't matter what side you're on, not giving him a peerage was quite obviously tit-for-tat over that and very little to do with his bullying, because none of them give a fuck about bullying. It's not rocket science m8.

How on Earth is a demented bastard like Claire Fox going to end up in the House of Lords? Replace the Upper House with 300 citizens chosen at random every twenty-four months, you get £45,000 a year, no tax, plus expenses. If you aren't a primary care giver or you have some kind of medical reason for not serving it's up against the wall. Alright, maybe you get thrown in the clink for a couple of months. Tell me that wouldn't be better than the current shambles?

>>90166
I could certainly get behind the idea of the Upper House being something like jury service, although perhaps you volunteer, and then do a month. Almost anything would be fairer than the current situation.

>>90167
Careful lad, you're getting dangerously close to suggesting a Citizen's Assembly.

>>90166
>300 citizens chosen at random every twenty-four months

Trouble with that is that you're asking 300 random nobodies to read through new laws line by line, understand them in the context of existing law, and suggest amendments.
Plus you lose the stabilising element of having an upper house full of people who will outlast several governments and so can contribute a modicum of long-term thinking.

The only major problem with the Lords that needs solving is the PM having the power to put whoever he likes in there.

>>90167
If it was volunteer based you'd just get nutters and time wasters. Plus many people would think "I can't do that, it's too complex" and not bother, even perfectly daft people are worthy of having a voice and more than capable of expressing it, half the folk in there now would probably struggle getting a spoon from their bowl to their mouth at any rate. The whole point of my idea is to empower people, to make them realise that it's just the absurdist and archaic ceramonies that make politics look complex. And you don't have to read The Wealth of Nations or The Civil War in France to know trillion dollar multinationals should pay taxes or balk at the idea of David Cameron's hairdresser getting an MBE. I don't care if you've spent the last ten years wearing the same trackies or just rolled your fifth Porsche doing ninety past a school, your name's going in the hat.

>>90166
>How on Earth is a demented bastard like Claire Fox going to end up in the House of Lords?

I mean, why not invite a revolutionary communist into the HoL at this point?

>Tell me that wouldn't be better than the current shambles?

Better to have demarchy address the problem of the Commons. You don't kill a snake by nibbling at its tail.

Juries are citizens selected at random to adjudicate on a person's guilt, as advised by the judiciary and clerks of the court. Magistrates are the same except you apply to be one. Why can't we apply a similar system to the Lords?

>>90172
Have thought a lot about becoming a magistrate.

>>90169
>Trouble with that is that you're asking 300 random nobodies to read through new laws line by line, understand them in the context of existing law, and suggest amendments.
I doubt the existing lords do that on a regular basis.

>>90169
You could probably get the same quality of scrutiny by having the parties appoint a few tens of lawyers and having them explain the gist of the legislation and answer any questions the members have. "Do people actually want this law?" seems a more relevant democratic concern than "is this good law?", and far too often the position of the Lords seems to be opposed to the democratic side of the equation (that is, opposing laws people want or supporting laws that they do not) without much counterbalancing "Actually, with the way you've worded this you'd make it a criminal offence to have been born in Dorset, so we'll have to send it back for revision."