A Spectator's Notebook
THE POMPOUS LANGUAGE in which the House of Commons Privileges Com- mittee clothed its recommendation that no further action be taken in the London Electricity Board case emphasises the fact that there was no action that could be taken. Even if the London Electricity Board had been guilty of a breach of privilege—the Committee of Privileges are almost alone in thinking that they were—what on earth could the House of Commons do about it? They could summon the Chairman of the Board to the Bar of the House and hope that he would humbly apologise for a breach of privilege, which most people think he did not commit. But if he refused to apologise, the Commons would either have to forget about it or send him off to Brixton. And the spectacle of a lot of power-happy MPs acting as judges in their own cause—and judging it wrong —and in so doing sending a respectable public servant to prison would produce such a public outcry that the whole silly business of the Com- mons Privileges Committee would probably be swept away. Their privilege jurisdiction, in other words, is only a shadow one; if MPs tried to put substance into it, it would disappear, and that is sufficient measure of its absurdity. Of course in spite of everything that the Privileges Committee has said and done; the London Electricity Board could still take proceedings, but in the nature of things a nationalised industry is not the sort of body to stand up to Parliament.
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