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Political Ethics: The Nolan Report*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Hugh Berrington
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Extract

REPRESENTATIVES ARE RARELY REPRESENTATIVE OF THOSE THEY represent. The most widely bruited cause of this paradox is the difference in social class; almost every study of legislators in Western democracies shows that they come from more well-todo backgrounds, are drawn from more prestigious and intellectually satisfying occupations, and are much better educated than their electors. Such contrasts alone would make for a formidable divide between representatives and the represented; but more significant than these external signs is the psychological gulf between politicians and ordinary citizens. For a few, politics consumes the greater part of their lives; for the many, politics is a matter taking up little time and absorbing little emotional energy. The belief systems of the politically active few will usually be complex and highly articulated; of the passive many, shallow and indistinct.

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Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 30 , Issue 4 , 01 October 1995 , pp. 431 - 451
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1995

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References

1 First Report of the Committee on Standards in Public Life Vol. I: Report Cm 2850–1 (Nolan Report, HMSO, London, May 1995).

2 Parl. Debs. (Commons), 6th Series, Vol. 249, 25 October 1994, col. 758.

3 Nolan Report: Letter from Lord Nolan to Prime Minister.

4 ibid. ch. 2, para. 24.

5 ibid. ch. 2, para. 25.

6 ibid. ch. 2, para. 26 and First Report, Committee of Privileges 1970–71, Appen dices to Minutes of Evidence.

7 ibid. ch. 2, paras 27 and 28.

8 ibid. ch. 2, para. 43.

9 Dennis Kavanagh, ‘From Gentlemen To Players: Changes in Political Leadership’ in Gwyn, W. B. and Rose, R. (eds), Britain: Progress and Decline, London, Macmillan, 1980 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Douglas, James, ‘The Conservative Party’ in H. Berrington (ed.), Change in British Politics, London, Frank Cass, 1984 Google Scholar.

10 See Parl. Debs. (Commons) 6th Series, Vol. 527, 13 May 1954, cols. 1439–1561 and Vol. 528, 24 May 1954, cols. 30–150 and Moran, Lord, Winston Churchill: The Struggle For Survival, London, Sphere Books, 1968, pp. 577 and 582Google Scholar.

11 Parl, . Debs., 6th Series, Vol. 262, 19 07 1995, col. 1705Google Scholar.

12 See below p. 11.

13 Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 47.

14 Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 13.

15 Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 14. Note that Criddle gives a figure of 143 for the number of Labour MPs sponsored by trade unions after the 1992 General Election. Presumably the discrepancy arises because Criddle includes only sponsorship by trade unions affiliated to the Labour Party. See B. Criddle, ‘The Candidates’ in Butler, D. and Kavanagh, D., The British General Election of 1992, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1992 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Park, T., Lewis, M. and Lewis, P., ‘Trade Unions and the Labour Party: Changes in the Group of Trade Union Sponsored MPs’, Political Studies, Vol. XXXIV, 06 1986, p. 308Google Scholar.

17 Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 14.

18 Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 104.

19 Parl, . Debs. (Commons), 6th Series, Vol. 260, 18 05 1995, col. 545Google Scholar.

20 ibid., cols. 557–58.

21 Financial Times, 15 July 1995.

22 Parl. Debs. (Commons) op. cit., col. 554.

23 ibid., cols. 507–508.

24 Seymour, C., Electoral Reform in England and Wales, David & Charles Reprints, Newton Abbot, 1970, p. 422 Google Scholar.

25 Hansard’s, Parliamentary Debates, 3rd Series, Vol. cxci, 26 03 1868, cols. 297–98Google Scholar.

26 Seymour op. cit., p. 424. Sir William Wade, the distinguished constitutional lawyer referred to this parallel in his written evidence. See Nolan Report, ch. 2, para. 100.

27 See above p. 437.

28 The Guardian, 19 May 1995. See also Duncan’s letter to The Times, 22 May 1995.

29 Namier, L., The Structure Of Politics At The Accession Of George III, Macmillan, London, 1929 Google Scholar.

30 ibid.,ch. 1.

31 Personal conversation.

32 Nolan, Transcripts of Oral Evidence (CM 2850–11), Sir Terence Higgins, p. 179.

33 Parl, . Debs., 6th Series, Vol. 260, 18 05 1995, col. 541 Google Scholar.

34 op. cit., col. 531.

35 op. cit., col. 525.

36 Nolan, Transcripts, p. 179.

37 Nolan, Transcripts, p. 178.

38 Despite the workaholic complaint of Dudley Fishburn, who announced his intention to leave Parliament at the dissolution because he did not have enough work to do. Daily Telegraph, 30 July 1995. See Sir Terence Higgins’s evidence in Nolan, Transcripts, p. 178.

39 Donald Searing, Westminster’s World: Understanding Political Roles, Cambridge, Mass, and London, Harvard University Press, 1994, p. 181.

40 R. R. James (ed.). Chips: The Diaries of Sir Henry Channon, London, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, p. 10.

41 Barber, James David, The Lawmakers: Recruitment and Adaptation to Legislative Life, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1965 Google Scholar and The Presidential Character: Predicting Performance in the White House, Englewood Cliffs, NJ., Prentice-Hall, 1972.

42 Park et al, op. cit. For the Conservatives, see Martin Burch and Michael Moran, ‘The Changing British Political Elite 1945–1983: MPs and Cabinet Ministers’, Parlia mentary Affairs, Vol. 38, No. 1, 1985.

43 Criddle, B., ‘The Candidates’ in Butler, D. and Kavanagh, D., The British General Election of 1992, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1993 Google Scholar.

44 See the interview with John Prescott in The Independent, 8 August 1995.

45 Anthony King, ‘The Rise of the Career Politician in Britain — And its Conse quences’, Britishjournal of Political Science, Vol. 11, July 1981. See also Peter Riddell’s excellent book Honest Opportunism: The Rise of the Career Politician, London, Hamish Hamilton, 1993.

46 King, op. cit, pp. 282–83.

47 Payne, James L., Woshinsky, Oliver H. et al, The Motivation of Politicians, Nelson- Hall Publishers, Chicago, 1984 Google Scholar.

48 Barber, James David, The Presidential Character: Predicting Performance in the White House, Englewood Cliffs, NJ., Prentice-Hall, 1972 Google Scholar.

49 Searing, Donald, ‘New Roles for Postwar British Polities’, Comparative Politics, Vol. 19, 07 1987 Google Scholar.

50 Parl, . Debs., Sixth Series, Vol. 262, Written Answers, 29 06 1995, cols 753–754Google Scholar. See also The Independent, 30 June 1995.

51 See above p. 434.

52 Sunday Times, 16 July 1995.

53 First Report, Committee of Privileges 1970–71, Appendices to Minutes of Evidence. Also referred to in Doig’s, Alan Corruption and Misconduct in Contemporary British Politics, Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1984, p. 220 Google Scholar.

54 ibid, and First Report.

55 First Report, Committee of Privileges 1970–71, Appendices, op. cit.

56 ibid.

57 ibid.

58 Author’s italics.

59 ibid.

60 See e.g., the letter from Sir Nicholas Fairbairn about the tactics of the Whips on the Maastricht Treaty Paving Motion debate, The Times, 10 November 1992.

61 Nolan Report, Summary, para. 2