On the 23^rd of October 2023 the House of Commons’ Westminster Hall considered two e-petitions. Both e-petitions roughly contended that it should be made a criminal offence for politicians to mislead the public and/or lie in the House of Commons. This seems pretty hard to enforce but the point stands that this potentially elucidates a rising awareness of dishonesty in politicians. 

Now, people have always lied and people accusing politicians of lying is nothing new, we can look to numerous scandals in UK politics to show this. Instead, there is a rising dishonesty in UK Politics not because of the prevalence of overt and innocuous lies but instead a more sinister form of misrepresentation of the stakes at hand, issues and even statistics. In this sense, a short-termist and opportunist political culture. This is particularly significant as without challenging this we may only do further damage to our political system and levels of trust in it later down the line. 

The UK’s current quagmire

The nature of the debate in immigration and asylum seekers illustrates the problem at hand very effectively. First, let’s take legal immigration. The UK Government recently announced a phased increase in the minimum salary threshold at which a migrant is entitled to bring their partner or spouse, from the current level of £26,200 to £38,700 in 2025 – while also prohibiting newly arrived care workers from bringing immediate family members from March 2024. Even though key sectors such as social care and hospitality are heavily reliant on immigration, there was little transparency from politicians about the impact this would have on public services or the UK’s wider economy.

Moreover, and perhaps this point holds for much of the UK’s discussion of immigration- there is no acknowledgement that the UK is a capitalist country in a capitalist international political economy. This is important as, for the UK to be a global nation of free trade and prosperity that many members of the UK Government want it to be, there must be free movement of labour as well as goods and services. In this sense, such immigration restrictions could seem ideologically and practically at odds with the Government’s own ambitions for the UK economy. Yet this contradiction is not addressed, with many members of the governing Conservative fuelling the short-term myth that punitive control of immigration is feasible- this may only do further damage in the long-term. 

Second, we can move to the UK’s discussion of asylum seekers. Towards the end of 2023, the UK Government claimed that they had cleared the asylum seeker backlog, only for the Government’s own statistics to show that 4,537 claims still existed. Thereafter, the Office for Statistics Regulation announced that they would investigate the Government’s claims. This complemented over 18 months of numerous Conservative Prime Ministers and Home Secretary’s telling the public that the Rwanda Plan would solve the UK’s small boats ‘crisis’. This is despite recent leaks showing that the current Prime Minister Sunak did not believe the plan would work when he was Chancellor. Likewise, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Chief Advisor Dominic Cummings admitted that the policy was initially created as a diversion rather than something that would be effective- yikes. Moreover, the UK’s Court of Appeal ruling against the Government’s Rwanda Plan suggested that the Rwanda Plan could only remove 100 people a year from the UK- it was later suggested that Rwanda could only house 200 migrants. In this regard, perhaps the Rwanda Plan represents more of an ideological farce than let on. 

We can also look at the nature of the debate over the economy in the UK. Gearing into the Autumn Statement of last year, the UK faced its highest tax burden since the Second World War. The UK Government’s Chancellor Jeremy Hunt and Labour’s Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves both condemned this as intrinsically unjust as they argued for and committed to tax cuts. Hunt later delivered cuts to National Insurance in the Autumn Statement while later teasing the idea of tax cuts before a future General Election too. Meanwhile, Starmer and Reeves have both committed to lower tax where possible while promising to deliver the highest level of growth in the G7- how this may be possible with potential cuts to public services has yet to be explicated. Funny enough, Hunt later backed down from the talk of his tax cuts in the Spring Budget as he retreated to his prior focus on cutting inflation. 

Let’s take it back to the fundamental issue though; politicians are not being clear about the issue here, as the Institute for Fiscal Studies warned. Perhaps the reason we have the highest tax burden since 1945 is because of the nature of UK’s rising and ageing population necessitates greater demands on the state; or the fact that we have the highest level of national debt since the 1960s; or the fact that a recent global pandemic and a war in Ukraine has distorted global supply chains and prompted an energy crisis; moreover, we have stagnating growth forecasts for at least the next 5 years; while  the demands of reaching net zero may only increase the responsibilities of the state. In this regard, pre-election tax giveaways or Labour simply claiming they will ‘create’ more growth will not fundamentally change the UK’s economic future and these ideas should not be presented as the all-encompassing solution that they presented as.

That last point elucidates why dishonesty in regard to immigration, asylum seekers or economic policy can be so damaging. This is not to say that the public cannot see through politicians but by misrepresenting the stakes at hand and presenting certain things as an easy solution politicians risk furthering existing disenfranchisement by favouring political short-termism and political opportunism. This is a particularly poignant point for the UK as politicians seemed so hyper aware of the disenfranchisement that had been channelled in the Brexit vote and increasing support for Scottish Independence. 

An intrinsic or extrinsic issue?

If UK’s political culture has an honesty issue and short-termist bias, then we need to conceptualise how and why. 

It may be worth stepping back from UK politics altogether, as we could look at this as an issue with human nature as Dennis Thompson argues in Representing Future Generations. The issue with human nature may be down to our fallibility as humans- we all make mistakes. This may come in the form of overestimating our capabilities to tackle issues; our cognitive limitations; or our bias to look at things we can see in action- this may create a natural short-term preference. To see the above we just need to look at our own seemingly innocuous actions on a day-to-day basis. This is not to say that all humans are impulsive, hasty and irrational but perhaps the preference of some to smoke tobacco, drink alcohol or eat unhealthy food shows our imperfection. This is not to shame these practices but rather to exemplify that to some extent imperfect human nature may breed imperfect politicians, political institutions and discourse. 

While this point seems intuitive and straightforward, it does not explain the varying standards we across different political systems and countries. In this regard, there must be some factors particular to the UK that have seen standards for political discourse worsen in the UK. 

On a macro level, the UK represents perhaps the archetypal Western Democracy with its parliamentary democracy and capitalist economy and society. On democracy itself, as Adam Przeworksi suggested in 1985, the presence of democracy may not necessarily be a good thing as democracy requires elections. Therefore, elections mean that politicians may have consider the needs and desires of the voters frequently. Additionally, regular elections can mean regular change of Government and therefore, democracy is inter-temporal. The regular change of Government may stipulate that change implemented by one Government may be undone by the succeeding Government. 

Perhaps a wider point to make here is that the presence of democracy does not guarantee better outcomes. Instead, its inter-temporal nature could breed opportunism, dishonesty and potentially inhibit the prospect of long-term planning. You only have to look at the abundance of reform to the UK’s education system since the 1980s with it all being sold as the golden ticket to tackling issues in educational attainment. The current Conservative Government’s focus on T Levels and apprenticeships to only abandon this in favour of ‘combining’ academic and technical education in the newly proposed Advanced British Standard almost perfectly encapsulates this. 

To add to all this, the UK’s nature as a parliamentary democracy with a plurality block electoral system in first past the post (FPTP) arguably worsens the UK’s susceptibility to short-termist and dishonest politics. Without delving into A Level Politics too much, there is some truth in this seemingly novice point. The UK’s electoral system usually breeds a two-party system and single party Government. This is damaging as it promotes an adversarial style of politics which may be good for the cameras but regularly change of Government from one party to another may only breed more inconsistency across Governments and reactive decision making. Consequently, perhaps in a more collective system we might see more deliberative and long-term decision making as everyone has a stake. This is important as it could mean increased transparency about the stakes and issues at hand. Additionally, FPTP cements Labour and Conservatives as the two major parties with no prospect of change; this not only gives unfair reading of the political climate, but it also means they face no external challenge to raise their own standards.

There might also be some comments to make on the UK’s economic system. Since the 1970s and 1980s the UK has been engaged in a dramatic shift away from the post-war consensus and the embracement of free market ideas in managing the economy. This was largely instigated by former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher but the neoliberal consensus that less state involvement in the economy equals better- both in an intrinsic and instrumental sense- has largely been continued in succeeding administrations. This is important as this has established an emphasis on profit and a focus on the selling off of state assets. 

On the profit dimension, the increasing importance of the private sector in the UK since 1980s has meant that capitalistic principle of profit has risen in significance. Perhaps then a focus on profit necessitates a focus on growing here and now and achieving profit as an end to itself. This point is very much akin to the prior point about the short-termism of elections in and of themselves and maybe the build-up to the 2008 financial crisis elucidates the perfect example of the short termism in free market economics. 

Moreover, as suggested earlier, the UK’s rapid move away from the post-war consensus has seen the selling off of state assets. This is significant as it has delegated state responsibilities to elements of the private sector to sustain the economic system. This can be seen in the privatisation of rail, royal mail, the use of private finance initiatives in health and education sectors or the delegation of the sovereignty of interest rates to the Bank of England. This delegation of responsibility means that often political actors are more powerless than they wish to let on. In this sense, they are being dishonest when they claim responsibility for some economic success and being dishonest when they undervalue the importance of the markets in the UK’s economic and political state.

Current Prime Minister Rishi Sunak taking responsibility for halving inflation is testament to this as this was largely down to the Bank of England’s control of interest rates. Alternatively, we could look to former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s right to buy policy in the 1980s, which instigated the selling off of council housing and arguably foreshadowed the housing crisis the UK sits in now. This has often meant that the current crop of politicians have been disingenuous about the stakes involved in the housing crisis, reasons for it and solutions to it. They are not being candid and accepting that simply building more houses may not fix the issue, as suggested in our piece here.

Potential policy solutions

Should we pursue electoral reform.

This argument is quite straightforward as it follows nicely from the point made about FPTP in the prior section: if FPTP breeds a dishonest and short-termist political culture, then we should look at alternatives to it.

Should certain policy domains be removed from the sovereignty of democratically elected politicians. 

Nonetheless, the prior solution seems to suggest that simply a more democratic electoral system will overcome the dishonesty and short-termist nature of democracy- this seems a confusing position to take. Moreover, there is little clamour for electoral reform in the UK given how fixed FPTP is in our system, with the failure of the referendum on Alternative Vote (AV) in 2011 encapsulating this. 

Therefore, maybe we need to look to reform how we conceptualise democracy by implementing reform within our political system. 

For example, if elected politicians having control over certain issues perpetuates a dishonest and short-termist political culture, then perhaps some issues need to be removed from their control. The argument line may be that these issues are so significant that they cannot be mishandled, and we should therefore have a democratic referendum to remove them from the control of politicians. On first thought, this could be climate change policy or spending for vital public services such as health and education. 

Should we have legal targets for significant policy issues.

This solution perhaps takes a similar line to the previous one but in a more nuanced manner. The same underlying argument stands: some issues are so important they should not be mishandled. Nonetheless, the conclusion is different as the solution is not to remove these issues from the control of politicians but rather to keep them in their control but to have democratically decided legal targets for these policies. This could be legal targets for employment, educational attainment, NHS waiting lists or climate change. 

Should we look at alternative systems of democracy and representation for certain policy issues.

In a similar vein to the two previous solutions, this solution rests on a claim that some issues are so important that they should be removed from the control of democratic politicians. Nevertheless, the conclusion is that these issues should be removed from the control of politicians and placed in the hands of alternative forms of democracy and representation- such as lottocracy and citizens assemblies. This removes the opportunistic, disingenuous short-termism nature of elections while also engaging the UK’s citizens. The most pertinent example of this might be Ireland’s use of citizen assemblies to address abortion provision. The closest we came to this in the UK was when then Conservative Leadership candidate, Rory Stewart, suggested the use of citizens assemblies in 2019 to resolve the quagmire of the UK’s Brexit settlement- perhaps this represented a missed opportunity. 

Should we protect certain vital assets from the private sector.

Moreover, by a very similar logic, if we are to protect certain policy issues from complete control by elected politicians then perhaps, we should protect certain assets from control or interreference from the private sector. This is not to say that state involvement will guarantee transparent conversations and long-term outcomes; but if we have found an issue with the increasing marketisation of public services and capitalism then it seems pretty fair to mitigate against this. 

Fixable or inevitable?

Nonetheless, while these solutions represent an opening, they also present new challenges. For instance, they raise moral intergenerational questions about the moral plausibility and fairness of binding future generations to these rules. In other words, is it fair to bind people 40-50 years down the line to legal targets and rules established in a different economic and political context- however, you could argue that future generations are already basically bound to democracy without consent but let’s not get lost with that thought. Back to issue and the use of citizens assembles and systems of lottocracy also raises new challenges as this may only cement political disagreement and quagmires rather than solve them. Therefore, potentially leaving them almost redundant. 

Additionally, you may think the issue of dishonesty and short-termism is inevitable in politics. After all, politicians will always exaggerate and misrepresent for their supporters- just like a glorified football manager who talks up their team after a heavy loss. However, the fact that this has happened before is not enough to justify this. We need to strive for better standards in public life and politics for it will damage us all if not and, for me, that begins with a transparent discussion about our current political and economic settlement.