The Commonwealth of Britain bill [ wikipedia | parliament ] was raised at the Chartist Conference yesterday and oddly I was notified tody of a conference on his legacy for next year. I mentioned him and his decline into parliamentary cretinism in my review of Simon Hannah’s book.
The wikipedia page lists the reforms, which are not particularly revolutionary, although some think the exclusion the Monarch is important. It rightly calls for the abolition of the House of Lords but wrongly in my mind calls for the Crown’s replacement with a President.
At the Chartist conference, I repeated my argument that the British system of government has become too presidential, and that this applied to the new Mayors, that we need to restore Parliament’s ability to hold governments to account; that PR is not enough, we need to consider a constitution, citizen’s assemblies and reforms to ensure that Hailsham’s electoral dictatorship can’t occur again.
I am actually impressed with Brown’s report and the reforms proposed there, and today we should consider the IfG’s criticisms of Treasury power which the conference had considered earlier.