One interesting 'new' feature of the Brown government is that announcements of government policy appear to be now being made directly to Parliament. Why is this new? Well for many years the habit had developed that a new policy would be heavily trailed in the press on TV and radio. This would be followed by the 'speech' being released to the media. There would be inevitable appearance of the appropriate minister or spokesman on the 'Today' programme, GMTV, all channels for Breakfast news programmes, 'Woman's Hour', 'The World At One', The Jeremy Vine Programme, The Daily Politics, and then by the time everyone had gone through the entire thing it would be announced in the House of Commons to about three MPs. John Denham made a statement to MPs without this usual preliminary distribution, and now ministers are telling John Humphreys 'I can't discuss this before I make the announcement to Parliament'. Excellent stuff. Gordon Brown then made a summer statement outlining what may well go into the Queen's Speech to allow some discussion before the Bills are drawn up. Sounds like a step forward to me. I'm also pleased to hear that the idea of the Supercasino may well be dead. Good for you Gordon. He's not likely to be so chummy with George Bush either.
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