How Westminster Works . . . and Why It Doesn't
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4.7 • 26 Ratings
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- £9.99
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- £9.99
Publisher Description
Features and Audio exclusive interview with Dorian Lynskey
British politics is broken.
Anyone sitting down to watch the news will get the sense that something has gone terribly wrong. We have prime ministers who detonate the economy, secretaries of state who are intellectually incapable of doing the job and MPs who seem temperamentally unsuited to the role. Expertise is denigrated. Lies are rewarded. And deep-seated, long-lasting national problems go permanently unresolved. Most of us have a sense that the system doesn't work, but we struggle to articulate exactly why. Our political and financial system is cloaked in secrecy, archaic terminology, ancient custom and impenetrable technical jargon.
Lifting the lid on British politics, How Westminster Works . . . and Why It Doesn't exposes every aspect of the system in a way that can be understood and challenged, from the heights of Downing Street to the depths of the nation's newsrooms, from the hallways of the civil service to the green benches of the Commons.
Based on interviews with some of the leading voices in politics, from former occupants of No.10 to key figures in Whitehall, Westminster and Fleet Street, Ian Dunt provides exactly what people in power have always tried to avoid: a full description of the mechanisms of British government. And a vision of how we can fix it.
Customer Reviews
Absolutely vital book
I have long been a critic of the democratic and functional deficiencies of British politics- (to the point where those close to me quake no doubt when they encounter me yet again climbing on this particular hobby horse.)
Even so , I was shocked by Ian Dunt’s lucid, detailed, devastating and above sane analysis at quite how dysfunctional and, at times, lunatic our system is.
The prevailing and destructive culture of what Dunt memorably describes as the ‘professional amateur,’ who dominates in both politics and the civil service is forensically exposed.
I challenge anyone who supports the status quo to still do so after reading this book. We have an urgent need of far-reaching democratic, constitutional and organisational reform. We really have suffered too long.