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Currant Affairs POLITICS IS IT FOR YOU? Biscuitbarrel and jarring politics 8:00am Thursday 18th March 2010 DO you fancy being an MP? Tarquin Fin-tim-lin-bin-whin-bim-lim-bus-stop-F’tang-F’tang-Olé-Biscuitbarrel certainly did. He stood as a candidate for the Monster Raving Loony party in the 1981 Crosby by-election but was pipped by the one time Swanage evacuee and Talbot Heath pupil, Social Democrat Shirley Williams. It was a big pip, to be frank. Mr Biscuitbarrel managed just a crumb of the votes polled – 223 or 0.4 per cent – and lost his deposit. Would he fare better today? We are on the cusp of a general election when an army of hopefuls wanting to become MPs will fork out £500 deposits to stand in constit-uencies up and down the country. It will be intriguing to see, in the wake of the expenses scandal, how many independent candidates stand and how many votes they poll. Curiously, a confidential survey – for a BBC2 documentary tonight – reveals of a quarter of today’s MPs are not enamoured with their life in politics. Their responses revealed many felt powerless, anxious, were seen as “hate figures” and were fed up with the public scorn. And 51 per cent of the 100 or so MPs in the survey felt the media was “ruining politics”. (Remind me, did the media claim expenses for moats, duckhouses and flipped homes?) A chunky 23 per cent of the MPs who took part in the BBC study said they wished they hadn’t gone into politics. At last some common ground with electors. In terms, of the bunch of MPs of all parties across Britain who bent the rules so disgracefully, we’d agree. Many of us wish they hadn’t gone into politics as well. Back to the list |