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| Will Self: 'Britain needs a written constitution – I’m available to write it' | Will Self: 'Britain needs a written constitution – I’m available to write it' |
| (7 months later) | |
| In a series to mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, the author declares that it’s high time British politicans stopped muddling and meddling | |
| Will Self | |
| Fri 16 Jun 2017 10.01 BST | |
| Last modified on Wed 29 Nov 2017 09.31 GMT | |
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| Patriotic Britons of all stripes often praise the excellence of our “unwritten constitution”. When I was at university, the key text we studied if we wanted to learn about this amazing thing-that-was-not-a-thing was a book by Walter Bagehot called The English Constitution, first published in 1867. In Bagehot’s view, it was the very provisional nature of our constitutional arrangements that made them fit for purpose: unlike those absurdly codified Americans, strapped into the rigid straitjacket of their Puritan forefathers, we muddle along in our inimitable English way. The legal foundation to our state is a strange mixture of common law and custom, together with various agreements struck to deal with historical contingencies – such as the imposition of inequitable taxes by self-deluding crypto-Catholic monarchs, or the millenarian views of our own, um, Puritan forefathers. | Patriotic Britons of all stripes often praise the excellence of our “unwritten constitution”. When I was at university, the key text we studied if we wanted to learn about this amazing thing-that-was-not-a-thing was a book by Walter Bagehot called The English Constitution, first published in 1867. In Bagehot’s view, it was the very provisional nature of our constitutional arrangements that made them fit for purpose: unlike those absurdly codified Americans, strapped into the rigid straitjacket of their Puritan forefathers, we muddle along in our inimitable English way. The legal foundation to our state is a strange mixture of common law and custom, together with various agreements struck to deal with historical contingencies – such as the imposition of inequitable taxes by self-deluding crypto-Catholic monarchs, or the millenarian views of our own, um, Puritan forefathers. |
| Martin Luther allegedly nailed 95 theses to the doors of various Wittenberg churches, and so launched the Reformation – I wish only to affix this single one with a blob of Blu-Tack to the gate of the Palace of Westminster: “Agree on a definitive constitution for this country, and write it down!” But as the great Gulliver of the British nation writhes uncomfortably in the bonds tying us to the lilliputian European Union, perhaps it’s time to acknowledge that muddling along is no longer good enough – especially when British government after government has not only muddled, but also meddled. | Martin Luther allegedly nailed 95 theses to the doors of various Wittenberg churches, and so launched the Reformation – I wish only to affix this single one with a blob of Blu-Tack to the gate of the Palace of Westminster: “Agree on a definitive constitution for this country, and write it down!” But as the great Gulliver of the British nation writhes uncomfortably in the bonds tying us to the lilliputian European Union, perhaps it’s time to acknowledge that muddling along is no longer good enough – especially when British government after government has not only muddled, but also meddled. |
| Scottish devolution and Brexit are both, I’d argue, the unforeseen consequences of constitutional meddling. Our current inability to get our rudderless polity back on course is surely down to our failure to address any of the following with sufficient rigour: the nature of the union between England and its Celtic fringe; the breakdown of the bicameral parliamentary system; the advisability – or otherwise – of fixed-term parliaments (something Bagehot saw as a weakness in the American constitution); and of course, our voting system – which might well have been adequate when boroughs were rotten and ballots were rigged, but scarcely seems fit for purpose now we’ve all got it into our heads that our opinion really counts. | Scottish devolution and Brexit are both, I’d argue, the unforeseen consequences of constitutional meddling. Our current inability to get our rudderless polity back on course is surely down to our failure to address any of the following with sufficient rigour: the nature of the union between England and its Celtic fringe; the breakdown of the bicameral parliamentary system; the advisability – or otherwise – of fixed-term parliaments (something Bagehot saw as a weakness in the American constitution); and of course, our voting system – which might well have been adequate when boroughs were rotten and ballots were rigged, but scarcely seems fit for purpose now we’ve all got it into our heads that our opinion really counts. |
| Our unwritten constitution carves out – I’d argue – a zone of inner political space, and it’s here we Britons indulge our peculiar sense of Manifest Destiny: for the very nebulousness of our own arrangements encourages us in the idea that it’s incumbent on us to impose them on everyone else. We claim to be the world’s longest-lived democracy – but with this unwritten proviso: our monarch can strike down any law or measure of our fabled parliament, since she retains absolute power (so long as she never uses it). It’s easy to see why such paradoxes fostered the mass delusion that rapacious imperialism was, for us, a duty ordained by God; what’s extraordinary is that we still think this way, constantly on the lookout for arenas in which we can enact our loathsome idiom by “punching above our weight”. | Our unwritten constitution carves out – I’d argue – a zone of inner political space, and it’s here we Britons indulge our peculiar sense of Manifest Destiny: for the very nebulousness of our own arrangements encourages us in the idea that it’s incumbent on us to impose them on everyone else. We claim to be the world’s longest-lived democracy – but with this unwritten proviso: our monarch can strike down any law or measure of our fabled parliament, since she retains absolute power (so long as she never uses it). It’s easy to see why such paradoxes fostered the mass delusion that rapacious imperialism was, for us, a duty ordained by God; what’s extraordinary is that we still think this way, constantly on the lookout for arenas in which we can enact our loathsome idiom by “punching above our weight”. |
| The Queen’s position as head of the Church of England is the result of yet more constitutional ambiguity; most foreigners I speak to have no idea we have an established church, and while I like the idea that every Anglican vicar is required to minister to every parishioner, regardless of their faith, it does seem odd to me that our allegedly inclusive nation remains, strictly speaking, a theocracy. Perhaps all of our breastbeating over “our values”, and how those pesky jihadists fail to share them, would come into sharper focus were we to actually set them down in black-and-white. The idea is that our storied parliament (which, as I write, seems more fictional than ever) should enact a “Great Reform Bill” as Brexit proceeds, enshrining all the good stuff from the discredited EU and its institutions, while jettisoning all the rubbish about straight bananas. | The Queen’s position as head of the Church of England is the result of yet more constitutional ambiguity; most foreigners I speak to have no idea we have an established church, and while I like the idea that every Anglican vicar is required to minister to every parishioner, regardless of their faith, it does seem odd to me that our allegedly inclusive nation remains, strictly speaking, a theocracy. Perhaps all of our breastbeating over “our values”, and how those pesky jihadists fail to share them, would come into sharper focus were we to actually set them down in black-and-white. The idea is that our storied parliament (which, as I write, seems more fictional than ever) should enact a “Great Reform Bill” as Brexit proceeds, enshrining all the good stuff from the discredited EU and its institutions, while jettisoning all the rubbish about straight bananas. |
| In other words: it’s muddling and meddling as usual – which means we can probably look forward to plenty of Great Unforeseen Consequences. One constitutional problem that remains festering in the body politic could prove rather more significant than the time it takes ink to dry on vellum, or the Queen’s determination to enjoy Ascot. Some experts contend that the only legal basis for the very existence of the English state are the 1707 Acts of Union between the English and Scottish crowns. Should those pesky Scots finally get fed up – in the immortal words of Irvine Welsh’s Renton – with being “colonised by a nation of wankers”, then the whole rickety business might simply collapse in a puff of dust. | In other words: it’s muddling and meddling as usual – which means we can probably look forward to plenty of Great Unforeseen Consequences. One constitutional problem that remains festering in the body politic could prove rather more significant than the time it takes ink to dry on vellum, or the Queen’s determination to enjoy Ascot. Some experts contend that the only legal basis for the very existence of the English state are the 1707 Acts of Union between the English and Scottish crowns. Should those pesky Scots finally get fed up – in the immortal words of Irvine Welsh’s Renton – with being “colonised by a nation of wankers”, then the whole rickety business might simply collapse in a puff of dust. |
| The anarchist in me thrills to the notion that the once proud British state apparatus should be brought so low – I smile at the vision of Black Rod, running about pulling on his useless plonker. But this is political onanism, pure and simple. No, what we need is a proper reform of our political system – and hence a written constitution. Preferably a well-written one. I might be persuaded. | The anarchist in me thrills to the notion that the once proud British state apparatus should be brought so low – I smile at the vision of Black Rod, running about pulling on his useless plonker. But this is political onanism, pure and simple. No, what we need is a proper reform of our political system – and hence a written constitution. Preferably a well-written one. I might be persuaded. |
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