Gardian Gagged – Is This Democracy?

It is sometimes hard to remember that we live in a democracy. There are plenty of examples where government appears not to listen to public opinion and does whatever it wants regardless but at least we usually know what they have done.

The Guardian is reporting that it has been prevented from writing about a question due to be asked in the Houses of Parliament by a gagging order in which somebody, or some company, has got a court to prevent the newspaper reporting on what is happening in Parliament. No matter that you elect these people to act on your behalf. It seems that a company or individual is able to prevent us knowing what is being said.

The Guardian reports that:-

Today’s published Commons order papers contain a question to be answered by a minister later this week. The Guardian is prevented from identifying the MP who has asked the question, what the question is, which minister might answer it, or where the question is to be found.

The Guardian is also forbidden from telling its readers why the paper is prevented – for the first time in memory – from reporting parliament. Legal obstacles, which cannot be identified, involve proceedings, which cannot be mentioned, on behalf of a client who must remain secret.
The only fact the Guardian can report is that the case involves the London solicitors Carter-Ruck, who specialise in suing the media for clients, who include individuals or global corporations.

Members of Parliament are protected and can basically say whatever they want in Parliament without fear of prosecution but it does seem ridiculous that in a democracy we are prevented from knowing what they say.

Presumably we will eventually get to hear about it one way or another but this seems to stink whichever way you look at it.

** UPDATE **

The Guardian has just announced that the ban on publishing has been lifted since lawyers acting on behalf of clients have given up their attempts to prevent the reporting of Parliamentary business.

The Guardian now reports that the question to be asked in parliament is the following one from Labour MP Paul Farrelly:-

“To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of legislation to protect (a) whistleblowers and (b) press freedom following the injunctions obtained in the High Court by (i) Barclays and Freshfields solicitors on 19 March 2009 on the publication of internal Barclays reports documenting alleged tax avoidance schemes and (ii) Trafigura and Carter-Ruck solicitors on 11 September 2009 on the publication of the Minton report on the alleged dumping of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast, commissioned by Trafigura.”

This will be a feather in the cap of Guido Fawkes who had correctly assumed this was the question that was being blocked from publication.here