COMMONS AS MUCK
AS HIS FINAL move before retiring, outgoing House of Commons Speaker John Bercow has introduced a “star chart” system to improve behaviour in Parliament. TV viewers were shocked last month to see cat-calling, jeering and aggressive barracking during heated Brexit debates, with many MPs criticised for their inflammatory rhetoric and so-called “unparliamentary language.”
Addressing MPs in his final speech before stepping down, Mr Bercow said that every member of the house would have their very own star chart, which will be put up next to their coat peg in the Commons cloakroom.
“Good behaviour, such as giving way politely on a point of order during a debate or doing ‘good sitting’ while a minister delivers a statement to the house, will be rewarded with a gold star to stick on your chart,” he told MPs.
session
However, Bercow warned that bad behaviour, including illegally proroguing parliament, lying to Her Majesty the Queen, or turning up halfway through a late session pissed as a fart, would result in a sad-faced sticker being affixed to a member’s chart.
“Ten gold stars on the trot will be rewarded with the right to submit an un-scrutinised expenses claim,” he told MPs. “But if you get one sad-faced sticker, for example for dissembling, using unparliamentary language during a debate, or putting your own post through a House of Commons franking machine, then it’s back to no stars.”
“Anyone who gets three sad-faced stickers during a single parliamentary term will have to sit on the back benches, right in the very far corner away from the BBC cameras so they can’t show off on television,” said Mr Bercow.
pale
And the Speaker revealed that a pilot scheme had been running during the previous parliamentary session to assess the new system.
He told MPs: “Mr Rees-Mogg was on nine gold stars for politeness, but then let himself down at the end of the Brexit debate and got himself a sad face sticker for slouching on the government benches when he should have been sitting up smartly with his hands on his lap.”
brown
“Similarly, Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Her Majesty’s opposition, received a sad-face sticker for not doing his tie up properly, anti-semitism, and turning up for a Select Committee meeting wearing jeans-type trousers,” Mr Bercow said.
the gopher
The shake-up comes after repeated reports of bad behaviour amongst MPs, culminating in an incident where Attorney General, Sir Geoffrey Cox came across a group of Tory backbenchers who had de-bagged Scottish Nationalist leader Ian Blackford in the toilets and were flicking him on the arse with wet towels.
Speaker’s plan to improve behaviour in chamber