Partygate is back, as news about fines for illegal lockdown gatherings trickles out. But politicians and journalists alike appear undecided as to whether there is really still a story here. Recent polling suggests Boris Johnson may have somewhat weathered the storm. Focus groups in late March, however, found that the story had cut through deeply. The state of current opinion remains uncertain.
Evidence covering a longer period can help to clear the fog. If people already cared about politicians’ integrity before Partygate, their anger over rule-breaking is more likely to endure.
This week, we at the UCL Constitution Unit have published the report of the Citizens’ Assembly on Democracy in the UK—the first such deliberative exercise to have explored UK public opinion towards democracy in depth. The assembly met online over six weekends towards the end of 2021. It had 67 members, carefully recruited to be representative of the UK voting-age population. They examined a range of topics, heard from numerous experts, listened to each other, deliberated and reached conclusions. They agreed eight broad resolutions and 51 detailed recommendations on how to strengthen our democracy.
The recommendations with broadest and most passionate support among members were on integrity in public life. Ninety-eight per cent of members backed a recommendation that “lying or intentionally misleading parliament” should be punishable as a “contempt of parliament.” Ninety-eight per cent also agreed that codes of conduct for MPs, peers and ministers should be strengthened. Ninety-six per cent said that “the public needs to be able to trust that the recommendations made after an investigation into ministerial conduct by an independent regulator appointed to do this will be respected and implemented by government.”
These responses cannot be put down to temporary swings in the news cycle. The votes on these recommendations were held in mid-December, before most of the Partygate stories came to light. Some early revelations, such as the Allegra Stratton video, had already emerged, as had the Owen Paterson scandal. But the mood was very different from a month or two later. What’s more, the view of assembly members was clear from the start. “Honesty in politics” was one of the core principles for good democracy that they agreed on early—with 98 per cent of members backing it.
Critics of deliberative processes such as citizens’ assemblies sometimes allege that the outcomes only reflect the biases of their organisers. But that is not the case here. Before the assembly, we conducted a major survey of public opinion. In July 2021, we asked the respondents—over 6,000 of them—what they viewed as the most important characteristics for politicians. Being honest and owning up to mistakes came top, well ahead of getting things done, working hard or being inspiring. We also asked what a future prime minister should do if faced with a choice between acting honestly and delivering the policy that most people want. Seventy-one per cent chose honesty and only 16 per cent delivery. And we asked respondents to choose between two statements: “healthy democracy requires that politicians always act within the rules” and “healthy democracy means getting things done, even if that sometimes requires politicians to break the rules.” Seventy-five per cent chose the former and just 6 per cent the latter.
In other words, last summer, before any of the recent scandals, overwhelming majorities prioritised integrity in their politicians—even at the expense of policy delivery. Taking part in a citizens’ assembly firmed up that view—and allowed members to channel their disillusionment into a set of concrete proposals for reform.
On seeing these findings, some people have said they show only that people like integrity in the abstract, not that they give it real weight. Indeed, some point to the election of a Johnson-led government in 2019 as evidence that most voters emphasise other considerations.
In fact, only 29 per cent of eligible electors voted for Johnson’s Conservatives in 2019. More broadly, many people view politicians as “all the same”—so integrity doesn’t much help them to distinguish one party from another.
Those who think dishonesty among politicians doesn’t matter because it doesn’t shift votes are fundamentally missing the point. Disaffection with politicians’ behaviour is deeply corrosive of public support for—and engagement with—our democratic process. If we allow that to continue, we will all lose out.
