Race for the Speaker: from hope to despair

A few weeks ago I wrote about my support for Frank Field to be the next Speaker, but at that time there were a few other names being touted who could have been pretty radical and anti-establishment.  Now just an hour and a half before voting starts the line-up looks pretty uninspiring and is a real let down if parliament is to genuinely reform itself.  I think Michael Martin may have been unfairly scapegoated, but ousting him as Speaker was an opportunity to make a real difference to the public perception of the House of Commons.  Unfortunately Parliament looks as though it won’t do that.

However, rather than writing my own post on it, Alex Wilcock pretty much sums up how I feel.  So my advice is to read his post instead.  My main criteria for Speaker would be for it not be another grandee or party hack but with a zeal for reform.  That pretty much limits the options and many of the people who now portrait themselves as reformers don’t really have a long track-record of it.  Like Matthew Huntbach in a comment on the Liberal Democrat Voice piece about the Speaker’s race, I can’t quite get used to John Bercow being a cuddly left-wing Tory when not that long ago he was a right-wing headbanger, however I think if I had a vote I could just be tempted to go for him.