Brutal killing shows we must put respect back into politics
THE brutal killing of Sir David Amess while he conducted a constituency surgery yesterday has left all decent people shocked and many questioning what kind of society we are becoming.
Sir David was the fourth MP to be stabbed this century while carrying out constituency duties and the second to be killed by an assailant. A little over five years ago the terrible murder of Labour’s Jo Cox caused the same feelings of numbness and horror that we feel today and led to campaigning ceasing for several days in the EU referendum.
As an MEP at the time of that heinous crime, I remember turning around and heading home when the awful news of her death came through on the car radio as I was driving to a public meeting. Coincidentally, just a few days earlier I had spoken at a pro-Leave rally arranged by Sir David in his Southend constituency. The banter and bonhomie that flew back and forth between him and his constituents left an abiding impression that day. Though he was a keen Brexiteer, he showed not the slightest inclination to badmouth those who took an opposing stance and the general esteem in which he was held was plain to see.
NO DOUBT the murder of Sir David will lead to yet another police review of security arrangements surrounding MPs and rightly so. No doubt too, there is more that could feasibly be done to protect them from extremists and from those in their communities undergoing psychotic episodes.
The ease with which groups of fanatical activists are able to get up close and berate MPs aggressively in the streets around Parliament itself must also surely be looked at again.
But many MPs relish being accessible to people in their constituencies and will be very reluctant to become distant figures. Their constituency surgeries are, for most, a key part of their democratic role. As the former Labour MP Gloria De Piero noted yesterday, the idea of providing round-the-clock protection for all 650 of them is probably a non-starter.
Where intelligence picks up particular threats then clearly a security response should follow. And better advice about basic steps to take to minimise the risk of an attack will also be widely welcomed. But to allow the threat posed by extremists to lead to the end of spontaneous chats between MPs and constituents at the supermarket would fundamentally alter our political system for the worse.
While the motives of the man who killed Sir David are not yet known and the evil deed is his responsibility alone, it is hard to dispute that this terrible event should cause everyone engaged in the political process to consider their own responsibility to raise the tone in which politics is conducted.
All of us need to take a stand against a general coarsening in the conduct of politics and work to reverse a baleful trend towards the withdrawal of basic levels of respect towards those advancing competing arguments.
It was not so very long ago that it was taken for granted that opponents should be accorded the presumption of being well-motivated. Politics focused on issues, rather than on seeking to suggest that the person arguing the contrary case must be morally bankrupt.
Too often these days the man is being played rather than the ball, a trend that has flourished in the ultra-partisan environment of social media.
EVEN yesterday, as Sir David fought for his life, some members of the competing tribes of Twitter sought to extract partisan advantage from what had happened.
The key to raising debate out of such a sewer is to set an example by engaging with opponents respectfully and condemning those on their own side who resort to abuse or character assassination.
Margaret Thatcher once observed: “I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.” That may well be true but, unfortunately, in the modern era the intensity of rhetorical personal attacks and the ease with which they are communicated is helping to create an atmosphere where political opponents are seen as quarry rather than worthy intellectual adversaries.
A physical assault on any MP is also an assault on the right of all of us to be represented in Parliament by the person we sent there. It is surely time for the courts to come down much harder on those who knowingly set out to intimidate democratically elected representatives.
Meanwhile, we can only send our deepest condolences to Sir David’s family for the loss they have suffered in such truly dreadful circumstances.
‘The esteem in which Sir David was held was plain for all to see’