Who do you trust with the future of the country? This week we’ve seen both the best and the worst of democracy play out right in front of us.
On Tuesday, two bills which came about because real people asked for the law to be changed got royal assent. One was the Tenant Fee Bill, which came out of my own campaign #MakeRentingFair as part of a coalition with Baroness Grender, Shelter, Generation Rent and hundreds of thousands of people who made their voices heard. The other was Gina Martin’s the Voyeurism (Offences) (No. 2) Bill which came about after her campaign to ban upskirting which she worked on with Lib Dem MP Wera Hobhouse.
Today, teenage pupils in schools all across the country are on strike. They’re walking out of their classrooms not, as you might expect, because they can’t be arsed with learning but because they want to know what the point of getting an education is when the Government doesn’t pay attention to experts when they voice their concerns about climate change and how little is being done about it.
These young people are joining an international movementwhich is intended to draw attention to the ‘climate emergency’ we currently face globally. It comes after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report on the very pressing impact of the Earth’s rising global temperature which was released last Octoberwith, frankly, not much of a fuss despite the fact that it warned that we have just 12 years to act and limit a ‘climate change catastrophe’.
And then, by contrast last night, there was yet another development in the ongoing, ongoing saga that is Brexit.
The Prime Minister’s Brexit plans were, once again, defeated and, as ever, pretty much everyone apart from her saw it coming. Not quite sure what actually happened or what it even means? You’re not alone. At this point, Brexit is a bit like coming to The Sopranos at the end of the series. The episodes make absolutely no sense if you haven’t been watching closely from the beginning.
But, like the bit in the show where they take ‘Pussy’ out on the boat to [SPOILER REDACTED], last night’s Valentine’s Day Brexit defeat is part of a bigger story and will change the course of things to come.
We’re now hurtling towards Brexit at breakneck speed but even Theresa May’s own party can’t agree on whether or not they back her version of Brexit, with some saying the government hasn’t properly communicated with MPs. Her plans were rejected by a majority of 45 after Conservative backbenchers decided to rebel against her. Once again, we’ve gone one step forwards and one step back when it comes to agreeing on what a Brexit deal will look like, meanwhile the clock continues to run down until Britain is no longer a member of the EU on March 29th.
When you think about the mostly unintelligible chaos that is Brexit’s progression (or lack thereof) through Parliament there is no doubt whatsoever that, climate change and the housing crisis aside, it’s the biggest issue facing our country right now.
So why, I wonder, is parliament finding it so hard a) to agree and b) clearly explain to the people they work for – that’s you and me – what’s going on.
In a week where there have been clear wins for democracy and society as a whole in the shape of a ban on extortionate and unaffordable letting fees and the criminalisation of violating anyone by upskirting them, Brexit stands out like a sore thumb.
These days anyone under the age of 35 who expressed a strong view is often quickly dismissed as a ‘snowflake’ by older generations. Well, this week, two snowflakes changed the law and made the country a better place and now a huge group of them are making a stand because they feel obliged to draw attention to the biggest threat our planet has ever faced because they know climate change is too urgent a crisis to ignore.
How did the Prime Minister respond to their decision to make such an impressive stand? A spokesperson for her has called them ‘disruptive’. ‘Everybody wants young people to be engaged with the issues that affect them most so that we can build a brighter future for all of us’ they said ‘but it is important to emphasise that disruption increases teachers' workloads and wastes lesson time that teachers have carefully prepared for’.
While MPs continue to fight amongst themselves about Brexit, people everywhere are making their voices heard. It’s said that young people aren’t political but, perhaps the truth is that they just don’t engage with parochial party politics in the way that political nerds wish they would because, as they see it, there are bigger fish to fry.
Politicians are meant to represent the people but, right now, you’d be forgiven for wondering who is actually be suited to make decisions about this country’s future.
If it’s disruptive to walk out of a lesson because you’re worried about our global climate emergency what does that make an elected representative who puts their own ideology ahead of the best interests of their country? Everyone but the government could see yet another defeat for their Brexit deal coming and it's equally clear whose side history will be on when it looks back on today's student climate protests.
As a no-deal Brexit looks ever more likely, this week protestors made more sense than politicians