Brown's pernicious and malign Bill

I am viscerally angry at Brown's tawdry and malignant Bill, published yesterday. Not only because it robs Parliament of authority and hands it to the government. Not only because it treats MPs like sales executives. Not only because it corrodes the authority of Parliament and bolsters the power of unelected civil servants. Not only because it favours the foetid political class of sycophants, jobsworths, placemen and fools over men and women of integrity and experience. Not only because it is a shamelessly partisan and spiteful little measure, and not only because it steals from MPs rights which their predecessors have shed blood for.

No, I am principally angry because it treats us all like fools and is as insulting as a gob of spittle in the face for the voters of Britain. If this nasty little Bill becomes law, as I suspect it will, Cameron will lose my support unless he pledges to dump it at the first opportunity. Brown, in his reptilian cunning, imagines that incorporating provisions on outside earnings - for which MPs will face imprisonment if not fully declared, and which affects Tory MPs to a greater extent than Labour - will make this is a difficult Act for Cameron to dump. Here Brown underestimates the intelligence of voters and, as always, overestimates his own abilities.

Make no mistake. This is an anti-democratic, pernicious and malign little Bill. Consider this provision;

(8) An order under this section may provide .. for specified property, rights and liabilities which subsist wholly or mainly for the purposes of the House of Commons to be transferred to the IPSA by a scheme

You see, Brown's new Quango doesn't merely check MPs' claims - it pays them. Rather than Parliament owning its own pay chest and being its own master, MPs will now be employed by the government. Brown has taken Parliament's resources from them. And who decides just how much of Parliament's property, rights and liabilities are to be transferred to the government? Why, a government minister, of course! With the complicity of Brown's Speaker, Mr Bercow;

(9) A scheme made by virtue of subsection (8) is to be made by a Minister of the Crown with the consent of the person who chairs the House of Commons Commission.

The last thing this nation needs is an Act that would pack the chamber with vile apparatchiks and 'professional' politicians, rob the Commons of its authority, turn our parliament into just a department of government and treat our MPs - returned by us to Parliament to exercise the thunderous powers and sovereignty of that body - as mere hirelings, irrelevant juniors.

Not only Cameron but all decent MPs must find their balls. Don't be afraid to oppose this most malignant of Bills.