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Sham of transparency shames our democracy

Sunday Herald Editorial

GORDON BROWN'S government doesn't seem to know the meaning of the term "transparency". Before last week's official publication of MPs' expenses - carefully edited to keep the public in the dark - the prime minister said he believed "transparency to the public is the foundation of properly policing this system".

The comment was supposed to herald the delivery of a new era of trust; trust perhaps borne out of Downing Street sensing that public faith in parliament had been eroded to a stump as wave upon wave of expenses scandals appeared in The Daily Telegraph. Yet when the official version of the expenses was finally released by the government, what lessons in required transparency had been learned? None. All that appeared were pages of black holes.

When much of the corrosive material was already out there and damaging the careers of MPs in all parties, there was nothing to be gained from an exercise that provoked universal condemnation, and provided yet another stick with which to beat a prime minister who is so hopelessly out of touch with the political climate that he made no effort to prevent this ludicrous censorship. His claims of transparency are a national laughing stock. Furthermore, the damage inflicted on Labour's poll rating can only get worse as the electorate becomes aware of the government's indifference - or is it contempt? - towards them.

Brown's decision to hold the promised Iraq war inquiry in private rather than in public simply magnifies the extent to which he and his government are out of touch. How can they stand up and declare that it would be against the interests of national security for details on the political decision behind the route to war to be open to public scrutiny?

In truth, details on how Tony Blair took Britain into an illegal war, and how Britain was marching behind US government policy dictated by the warmongers in George Bush's administration, have been under examination for some time. That Blair's promise of troops would come with a harsh political price was known by Bush when he congratulated the then prime minister for his "cojones" in doing so. The infamous "dodgy dossier" is widely acknowledged as one of Blair's greatest political errors. During the Hutton inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly, the High Court testimony of former defence secretary, Geoff Hoon, was greeted by waves of political laughter.

Together, these fragments of a jigsaw of lies and half-truths have eroded and destroyed the electorate's faith in new Labour. Perhaps a process of transparency, a truth commission if you like, could have begun a political healing process, a way back. But Brown, who leads a party already reconciled to defeat at the next general election, clearly lacks the understanding and the skills to reconnect with voters. Lost in the desert of blacked-out expenses details and the forced decision to subsequently allow a hybrid public-private inquiry whose terms of reference remains woolly in the extreme, he is an out-of-touch prime minister surrounded by out-of-touch advisers.

Even on the economy - where Cabinet ministers talk of newly discovered green shoots of recovery and Labour promises that public spending will continue to rise in real terms, despite the Treasury's own official figures saying the opposite - there is contempt for an electorate that is fully aware of the hollowness of such promises. The Bank of England has just reported the biggest slump in company lending in nine years. The record budget deficit for last month, £20 billion, taken alongside projections that the full-year deficit will be higher than the £175bn Chancellor Alistair Darling offered in April, does not point to recovery any time soon. In fact, proclamations of recovery and of spending rises hint at desperation and an unwillingness to confront the truth. Meanwhile, the government offers an inquiry that is officially there to conceal, not illuminate, and the publication of expenses forms that hide, black out and cover up.

Transparency should not be a gift from government, it is a duty that it should know it has to deliver on. Transparency should be a minimum standard, a democratic given that becomes the political habit for a government seeking to be in touch with its electorate. Right now, Britain has a sham of transparency, an illusion born of contempt. We have a government that proclaims the benefits of transparency, but that just doesn't get what it is required to do. Transparency is a dark heavy curtain pulled across all the government's activities. Someone needs to tell ministers to pull it open and let some light in.