Betty Boothroyd has called on the media to provide 'fairer and better balanced coverage' of the House of Commons. 'Above all,' she has warned, they 'should not use the occasion for highly generalised and unsubstantiated comments against Members of the House as a whole and the Parliamentary system'. The 'occasion' to which she refers is the inquiry being conducted by a new officer of her House, Sir Gordon Downey, Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. Sir Gordon is investigating allegations of corruption made against certain MPs by the Guardian newspaper. The allegations referred to payments and relationships between MPs, lobbyists and businessmen dating back more than ten years: ten years in which the media now berated by the Speaker displayed an almost unanimous reluctance to refer in any way to these delicate matters.

LRB 20 February 1997 | PDF Download