Letter: Politicians demonstrate a dire lack of professionalism

Anyone who works in the real world will know that their jobs have strict requirements, in terms of professionalism, knowledge and expertise, appropriate language and behaviour, etc.

Strangely, none of that seems to apply to politicians, particularly Members of Parliament.

Also, in the real world, there is usually a well-developed process for the resolution of problems and conflicts.

This doesn’t exist in Parliament. Here, problems and conflict quickly escalate beyond the meagre skill and expertise level of the MP’s, resulting in the primitive child-like behaviour of frustration, insults, name-calling, tantrums and retaliation.

Not only do politicians demonstrate a dire lack of professionalism, they compound this with a blatant level of self-interest, as witnessed by the recent expenses scandal.

When cornered, PM’s claim “to serve the public”.

In fact, this saying is actually a corruption of the original truer saying, of PM’s are there “to serve themselves out of the public purse”.

This has been taken to its logical full extent here in Sheffield, where the, (right honourable?), MP for Hallamshire is still taking his full salary, but doing exactly nothing for this constituency.

Visitors have often remarked on the decline of sheep visible in Yorkshire. In fact, they are all still there, it’s just that they now all live in Hallamshire.

Why else would this scandal have hardly prompted a murmur, (or a Bah)?

When the MP for Peterborough’s performance fell below acceptable standards, the electorate immediately moved to have her removed, and replaced.

And the reason why MP’s often vote ‘remain’, against their electorate’s vote? Self-interest, of course. It’s obviously much easier to get Brussels to do half your work for you, particularly if it doesn’t affect your salary, (Would this happen in the real world?).

So if the electorate cannot be relied on to hold politicians to account, what is the future for the political system, how to fix this dire political mess?

One possible avenue would be to make use of the world class universities we have in the UK. They usually have a “department of politics”. Surely this collective brain-power could come up with a better political system? Perhaps they have, and the current politicians have quashed it, fearing for their own self-interest.

After all, how many self-interested turkeys would vote for Christmas?

PS, Apologies to G Orwell for the various animal references, but it seems very appropriate, (even self-inflicted, with some of the animal noises coming from Westminster).