Philip Bowern on Wednesday
Parish had to go – but we need good rural MPs
SOME political scandals come as little surprise. When you hear that old so-and-so has been carrying on behind his wife’s back and has been forced into one of those excruciating garden gate interviews with his dutiful other half “standing by him”, you shake your head and say: “I always suspected he was a wrong ’un”
But Neil Parish, the farmer turned politician, in his corduroy trousers and practical tweed jacket, viewing pornography on his mobile phone in the House of Commons? Do me a favour... surely not!
Yet the tractor-searching MP for Tiverton and Honiton – who was looking for a bit of agricultural machinery on the internet when he chanced upon something a good deal more racy – has been named, shamed and resigned, all in a matter of days.
He said his moment of madness was going back for a second look at the pornographic website while in the Commons Chamber, waiting to vote. At least two women MPs saw him and complained. Now Mr Parish, majority at the last election an
impressive 24,239, will be but a footnote in the history of parliamentary scandals. The sniggering, which began when he was unmasked, will last for a while, but we will all move on.
Apart, that is, from Mr Parish who will be left cursing the ignominious end to his political career which – although hardly stellar – was, until last week, proving to be solidly worthwhile to his constituents and the wider farming community that he looked out for.
Of course he had to go. There are no excuses for viewing pornography at work, especially not in a crowded House of Commons. In fact, there are, arguably, no excuses for checking out the price of tractors on your phone when you are supposed to be legislating for the nation.
But while there was no going back for the now dishonourable member and chairman of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, it is also true that rural Britain can ill afford to lose MPs like Mr Parish.
No one is going to step up and defend him now. But there will be farmers across the Westcountry who view his ‘crime’ more in sorrow than anger and fervently wish it had been some urban wide-boy or slick member of the new intake who was caught out in such an embarrassing way, rather than the man they thought was dependable Neil, a politician on their side.
His record, in standing up for rural interests, was a strong one. As Environment Committee chair, he gave ministers and civil servants who he thought were taking decisions damaging to the countryside a justifiably hard time.
Once, when I was covering the Game Fair at Harewood House in Leeds, Mr Parish made the four-hour plus drive north to get onto BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, coming live from the event, just to speak up on rural issues. He was a doughty fighter on behalf of farmers desperate for effective measures to tackle badgers and bovine TB, and brought common sense and farming experience to hundreds of other rural issues during 12 years in parliament.
There was a time when MPs like Mr Parish, with solid experience in the real world before entering politics, were the norm. They can still be found, particularly in the fields of defence and the armed forces.
But politicians who know what it is like to try to make a living from the land are few and far between in our modern parliament and, as the pressures grow from those with wholly other interests when it comes to the countryside, we need them to keep a sense of balance.
Lord knows what the future holds for Neil Parish. At 65, he may decide that enough is enough. He clearly has some bridges to rebuild with his wife, Sue, who he accepts he has badly let down. It is very hard to see him making any kind of return to politics now. Meanwhile, the House of Commons needs to clean up its act. It could start by giving all MPs a simple message: “No phones in the Chamber.”
He was looking for agricultural machinery when he found something more racy