The House of Commons, we are told, is going to be televised as if
it were any old event. The broadcasters are to be allowed to cut to the
reactions of MPs instead of being confined to close-up shots of speakers
and a wide view of the chamber. They are even to be permitted to screen
the drama of demonstrations in the Mother of Parliaments.
Is this a good thing? As one who, in the 1980s, advised John Wakeham,
then Leader of the House, in recommending the rules for TV, I have my
doubts. I never shared Margaret Thatcher’s reluctance to admit the
cameras. Wherever she went in the world, she was asked: ’How on earth do
you cope in that bear garden?’ Radio broadcasts of Parliament left a
worldwide impression of a howling mob. I thought it would be far better
to put the noise in perspective by adding a new dimension - vision - to
its reportage.
In any case, I could hardly argue that television should be excluded
when the press and radio were already there. And, as the Prime
Minister’s press secretary, I had no doubt that televising the House
would be a bonus for one as much in command of the Commons and her
subjects as she invariably was.
But many MPs a decade ago were concerned about the way in which the
house would be televised. Many of them regarded TV as primarily an
entertainment medium and were in no mood to let the broadcasters make a
soap opera of the House’s proceedings. They wished to preserve its
dignity and standing as the source of law and where Government is held
to account. So Lord Wakeham, as he now is, gradually worked his way
towards the consensus over coverage which has so far held across three
Parliaments.
I don’t pretend that ministers or TV folk are happy. The position of the
cameras meant that, if front bench spokesmen spoke from notes, viewers
tended to see only the tops of their heads - as Tim Yeo, Shadow
Agriculture spokesman, showed last week. And the broadcasters felt
robbed when they could not get a close-up of Mrs Thatcher as Sir
Geoffrey Howe stabbed her in the back with his resignation speech or,
more recently, of the Earl of Burford dancing on the Woolsack in protest
at the ’treason’ of abolishing hereditary peers. I must also confess
that I do not think regular pictures of acres of unoccupied green
leather in the chamber do much for politicians.
But, however debased it has become, the Commons is still the fount of
our democracy.
It was never intended to be the plaything of television. It is there to
be reported, not corrupted. And it most certainly should not encourage -
as television does - exhibitionist demonstrators. The present move to
make the House more viewer-friendly could be a reform too far.
