The immortal Tories

The opposition needs to start seriously challenging the government’s reckless decree rule or we will be left with the one thing that both social conservatives and progressives fear. An immortal Tory party.

With each new week covering Prime Minister's Questions comes a new observation about the state of Britsh politics. Some are innocuous and others are horrifying.

In last week's PMQs diary, I noticed that we don't have a true opposition to hold the government to account for its liberty-stripping excesses. This week I saw the bleak future that awaits us unless serious opposition is posed. It is the fate which has befallen Scotland and Germany; a state which, while democratic by definition, is run by the decree of one party.

Strangely, both Labour’s Kier Starmer and the SNP’s Ian Blackford used their respective slots to go after the government on Yemen. Not the impending economic disaster, the mental health crisis, or the Coronavirus Act, which gives Downing Street the right to take our liberties away in a heartbeat. While the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is serious, and questions must be asked of the use of British arms in the conflict, the opposition dropped the ball by prioritising this. This was by far the weakest I've seen Starmer during these interactions as of late.

A welcome question came from Tory MP Sarah Atherton, who made the suggestion clear that STEM careers should be encouraged as much as possible. The question briefly allayed my reservation that government benches shouldn't be asking questions of the government, as it typically enables little more than time wasting and brown-nosing.

The next election is still some way away, but the writing on the wall gets clearer every week: the opposition needs to start seriously challenging the government’s reckless decree rule or we will be left with the one thing that both social conservatives and progressives fear. An immortal Tory party.