Striking at the heart of the British state

Not that we really do think that reform of the House of Lords would be a strike at the heart of that British state. But the principle, if more widely applied, would be:

Previous prime ministers have made liberal use of their unrestrained powers of patronage,

Well, yes.

…something must be done to stop prime ministers being able to pack their numbers with cronies and donors,

Quite possibly so.

….is heavily dominated by those with political connections.

Quite so.

So, what do we do to stop the quangos, the Arms Length Bodies, from being run by those selected in such an obviously absurd manner? Those are the bodies with the real power in our state structure so how do we rid ourselves of the cronies, donors and those with no merit - to be very liberal with the meaning of that word “merit” - other than their political connections?

Our preference would be to not have the quangos, the ALBs. If something’s not important enough to be run by someone elected - which means we can throw them out - then it’s not important enough to be done by government. For part of that social contract which leads to the idea of government is that we can throw them out as and when we tire of them. That being, as PJ O’Rourke pointed out, at the next opportunity to do so among the sensible.

Quangos and ALBs produce a level of government that we cannot throw out - therefore, in the name of that sacred democracy we must get rid of them.

Of course, this is all entirely obvious to any thinking person but we promise that we’ll have some actually radical ideas later in the year.