New Speaker

So John Bercow (or Smeagol as he shall henceforth be known on this blog) has been appointed as Speaker of the house on the back of Labour's desire to piss the tories off. What he does in the next few months will prove crucial to how long he survives in the job. If he is totally impartial and champions intelligent reforms he has a chance. His first test will be PMQ's on Wednesday. He could make a good start by ending the whip-fed questions from the labour benches and also making sure Brown is held to account. Also pointing out that it is 'Prime Ministers' questions, not leader of the opposition's questions wouldn't go amiss as Brown seems to have forgotten that.

In short, he's on probation.



The first part of his reforms is a radical new direction on the speaker's uniform.