Is the Bercow thing getting out of hand?
Could we see another speaker being forced out?
The above is a quick Google News search that I did earlier this evening on the speaker, John Bercow, and as can be seen he’s involved in quite a range of different controversies which will just add to the “whispering campaign” amongst Tory MPs that is said to be going on.
Their complaint is that he’s being unduly helpful to Labour and over-harsh the government, particularly members of the party that he left on taking office in June 2009.
From a former speaker, Betty Boothroyd, suggesting that Bercow’s scruffy to his rows with Tory MPs and his public comments on the hunting ban there seems to be a new John/Sally Bercow story coming out every couple of days.
In an insightful piece a former Tory MP who has known Bercow for a long time, Paul Goodman, of ConservativeHome, suggested that a common theme is Bercow’s temper.
Goodman concluded: “I wonder if the origin of that temper is frustration, and whether the source of that frustration is anger, welling up in turn from rejection – from being spurned by those who wouldn’t applaud him, promote him, consider him as a future leader: “Heav’n has no Rage, like love to Hatred turn’d.” Bercow should last this Parliament out – and others too, if his seat doesn’t somehow fall casualty to the coming constituency cull, or his career to his wife’s Labour ambitions. But if the Commons comes to hold him in contempt, guying his mannerisms as he mocked those of his former colleagues, I wouldn’t put money on it.”
One of the problems is that the precedent that was set in the last parliament with Michael Martin. The events of two years ago make predictions about Bercow’s future that bit more difficult.