Words of wisdom spoken by Peter Riddell on the LBC Bookclub last night. Peter was in conversation with Mehdi Hasan who's covering for Big Cheese this week while he fills Ferrari's shoes in the morning slot. It should be said that I quite like Iain doing these early mornings. He's a shadow of his former self, I made numerous inappropriate jokes yesterday that prior to sleep deprevation would have landed me in hot water. Yesterday I was met with mere indifference. I'm sure he'll get used to it...
Mehdi and Peter spoke for half an hour about the perceptions in this country of politicians and the political process in honour of his recently published book In Defence of Politicians.
Peter, in his own defence - because no one's yet written a book called In Defence of Peter Riddell - said on the show that he thinks that 30-40 of the MPs caught out in the expenses scandal are common crooks. He also said that the clear majority are 'good' MPs though perhaps they're morally weakened by going along with the faults inherrent to the system. Mehdi, for good measure, pointed out that most just didn't want to create waves.
An important point made last night and in Peter's book is that the distrust surrounding politicians now, isn't new. There has always been a certain mockery, or sceptical view of them - that they've always, in one way or another, been thought of as 'in it for themselves'. It's just that now they've forfeited the right to scrutinise themselves. Though they may hate outside scrutiny.
Peter maintains that there are ways of garnering greater respect and countering the current 'anti-politics' mentality but you'll have to read the book yourself for Peter's points. What's the point of us publishing books if I'm going to tell you everything that's in them on the blog? Mwah ha ha haa.
In Defence of Politicians is available now, priced £9.99