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Parliament has its bad pennies, but Claire Fox is far more worried that its detractors will only undermine democracy. The expenses scandal seems to have brought an excess of radical hyperbole from the most unlikely and conservative of quarters. Should those of us of a rebellious disposition be cheering? I'm afraid not. I fear that both politics and democracy will be the losers in this sorry tale. To start with, instead of holding politicians to account for their policies, we are left studying their accounts. Take the fate of [communities secretary] Hazel Blears, which may be resolved by time you read this. I am no fan of hers, but would rather she be judged on her record as an unabashed supporter of the Government's most reactionary policies than her tax shenanigans. Lest we forget, Ms Blears' policies have included ASBOs, cheerfully demonising and punishing ‘nuisance neighbours', ‘chaotic families', and binge drinkers, and an unbroken record in voting for the Iraq war, identity cards and detaining terror suspects without charge for 42 days. This is not a minister who holds democracy dear. Later, she used the prospect of the recession to scaremonger against the possible mob reactions of the unemployed. That alone should have been enough for the media to turn on her. Worse still, a white knight has appeared on the horizon, with reports that Ms Blears could face a parliamentary challenge from sleaze-busting Martin Bell. Esther Rantzen, the populist TV presenter and over-zealous champion of child protection charities, has also announced that she will stand against another scandal-ridden MP. Tory leader, David Cameron, has opportunistically declared he will welcome famous figures becoming Conservative MPs, together with any other non-Tories who've got talent. The rise of celebrity independents epitomises the non-political and anti-political culture at the heart of the expenses' debate. These wannabes' boast that their qualifications are that they are non-affiliated and distant from the compromised world of partisan parties. Is then one of the legacies of the expenses scandal, to be a purge of anyone associated with party politics in favour of previously-apolitical individuals? Doesn't that miss the point? The problem is that political parties have become hollowed-out, and too many MPs seem so bereft of vision or principle that all we can imagine they are involved in politics for is the ‘filthy lucre'. The last thing we need is to problematise the very idea of parties and replace party hacks with political naifs. Too many of the players in this story are sidelining democracy in the name of cleaning up politics. It is no coincidence that so many of those who have ‘stepped up' come from the unelected opposition – the self-righteous media. Journalists are cavalier in spreading the rumour that the elected part of parliament has been too independent and too free to set its own agenda. But their ‘solution' is the advocacy of wholly-undemocratic, external authorities to intervene in the workings of the Commons. But, as local government should know, another layer of unelected bureaucrats to police elected representatives creates more problems than it solves. Of course, it is hard to defend the democratic ideal when one thinks of the Commons as it currently manifests itself, with its systematic undermining of local democracy and liberties. Ms Blears' humiliation may have an element of schadenfreude, and it's easy to whoop ‘Gotcha' when [work and pensions secretary] James Purnell is caught out, having endured his illiberal haranguing of ‘benefit scroungers'. But let's drive them from office for their political deficits rather than what amounts to fiddling the petty cash. The only people Mr Purnell and Ms Blears should be accountable to is us, through the ballot box. If we – the public – allow the great and the good to allot us a role as merely angry tax-scrutineers whose only interest in politicians is in their moats, it robs us of our real democratic power, as the masters of our representatives and their political ideals, or lack of them. Claire Fox is director of the Institute of Ideas

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WHITEHALL

Democracy under fire

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