Brexit.

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

In the US, a grand jury is made up of ordinary citizens, who serve for a limited term, investigating if there is enough evidence to indict someone for a crime. People can be excused from jury duty for a good cause. For example, when I was taking care of my mom, and couldn't leave her alone, a doctor's note got me excused. Parents with children at home were regularly excused.

And that's exactly the wrong example - the jury in US juridical system has the final say on some topics. The jury system is flawed beyond belief; the jury should have only the role of an advisor, but not as the main decision maker.

 

[Kara Spengler]

The curtain has been lifted: former speaker of the House of Commons John Bercow is a remainer. He had a speech at the Foreign Press Association in London.

“I don’t think it helps the UK. Brexit is the biggest mistake of this country after the war. I respect [the] prime minister, [Boris] Johnson, but Brexit doesn’t help us. It’s better to be part of the [EU] power bloc,” Bercow said, according to the journalist Antonello Guerrera, of La Repubblica, who attended the event in London.

God, I am going to miss his ties...

John Bercow: Brexit is UK's biggest mistake since second world war

Former Speaker tells foreign media UK is better off as part of EU power bloc

www.theguardian.com

TLDR has a shoppe ...

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

 

[Tigger]

And we now have the Tory Election that stole Christmas: Schools are commonly used as poling stations but the December 12th date will clash with many schools nativity plays and similar events which will have to be cancelled.

Nativity play school polling stations row deepens

Election officers hit back angrily at call to stop using schools for polling stations.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

And that's exactly the wrong example - the jury in US juridical system has the final say on some topics. The jury system is flawed beyond belief; the jury should have only the role of an advisor, but not as the main decision maker.

Grand Jury and trial jury are not at all the same thing.

 

[Tigger]

Grand Jury and trial jury are not at all the same thing.

And the basic concept of convening a meeting for the purposes of evaluating a single issue certainly has merit.

 

[Arkady Arkright]

I think a term of one year would be appropriate, ideally accompanied by a decent, MP salary scale payment. A free to enter lottery that grants you the chance of membership of the house for 1 year and 100k tax free should get plenty of applicants and that way at least you know all the applicants are willing.
My initial thoughts are that the make up of the new house should reflect the make up of the country in as many metrics as possible, but that could be argued as unfair and maybe we would do better to try to boost participation from minorities and groups subject to discrimination.

And whoever wins has to move to London, away from family, friends etc. for a year ? I can only see this working if it's done via IT, with people 'meeting' from their own homes wherever they may be. I think this is technically feasible, but whether our London-centric administration and civil service would allow it to happen is debateable.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

And whoever wins has to move to London, away from family, friends etc. for a year ? I can only see this working if it's done via IT, with people 'meeting' from their own homes wherever they may be. I think this is technically feasible, but whether our London-centric administration and civil service would allow it to happen is debateable.

Why would they have to move to London? MPs for constituencies outside London normally maintain a home in the constituency as well as secondary accommodation in London, and certainly membership of the House of Lords doesn't oblige peers to live in London if they don't want to.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

And the basic concept of convening a meeting for the purposes of evaluating a single issue certainly has merit.

Depends on the issue, I would think.

How is a meeting convened to discuss, for example, counter-terrorism legislation not going to involve itself in issues of human rights, data protection, and the respective roles and responsibilities of the police, the security services, schools, universities, HM Prisons and the UK Border Force?

 

[Tigger]

Depends on the issue, I would think.

How is a meeting convened to discuss, for example, counter-terrorism legislation not going to involve itself in issues of human rights, data protection, and the respective roles and responsibilities of the police, the security services, schools, universities, HM Prisons and the UK Border Force?

Semantics. Brexit is a single issue. It just happens to be a single issue that touches almost every area of life.

 

[Kara Spengler]

And whoever wins has to move to London, away from family, friends etc. for a year ? I can only see this working if it's done via IT, with people 'meeting' from their own homes wherever they may be. I think this is technically feasible, but whether our London-centric administration and civil service would allow it to happen is debateable.

That could be problematic.

Of course actual meetings and debates are doable. Voting gets a bit dicey though. Not as problematic as a general election (unless you want votes by a legislature to be secret) but it does raise some issues.

 

[Tigger]

And whoever wins has to move to London, away from family, friends etc. for a year ? I can only see this working if it's done via IT, with people 'meeting' from their own homes wherever they may be. I think this is technically feasible, but whether our London-centric administration and civil service would allow it to happen is debateable.

There are government buildings all over the place, courts, council offices. It must surely be possible to get people to some relatively local place from which they can remotely attend whatever kind of sessions are necessary. This whole forum sprang from SL which is one kind of technology that could make virtual meetings possible.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Semantics. Brexit is a single issue. It just happens to be a single issue that touches almost every area of life.

You'd said that "the basic concept of convening a meeting for the purposes of evaluating a single issue certainly has merit. "

Did you actually mean "convening a meeting for the purposes of evaluating one or more issues certainly has merit"?

I don't quite see what's so important about the number of issues the meeting is supposed to discuss -- when wouldn't the idea of convening the meeting have merit, assuming that the issues to be discussed aren't trivial?

 

[Daniel Voyager]

3 months? If we do eventually leave, we will still be 'brexiting' for years to come as the next stage of negotiations start and go on and on and on and on. Do we start a separate thread for the negotiations to re-join?

Another 3 years at least.

 

[Essence Lumin]

And that's exactly the wrong example - the jury in US juridical system has the final say on some topics. The jury system is flawed beyond belief; the jury should have only the role of an advisor, but not as the main decision maker.

A grand jury is different than a regular jury. A grand jury listens to some of the evidence and decides whether a case should go trial as opposed to a regular criminal jury which acquits or convicts the defendant.

 

[Brenda Archer]

A grand jury is different than a regular jury. A grand jury listens to some of the evidence and decides whether a case should go trial as opposed to a regular criminal jury which acquits or convicts the defendant.

With the way the Republicans have been stuffing the judiciary with completely unqualified extremists, juries may be the only thing left to keep people from being unfairly convicted in obvious ways.

 

[Arkady Arkright]

Why would they have to move to London? MPs for constituencies outside London normally maintain a home in the constituency as well as secondary accommodation in London, and certainly membership of the House of Lords doesn't oblige peers to live in London if they don't want to.

For 'move' read 'commute' then - my point was that it should be possible, with modern technology, to avoid people having to be physically present before business can be conducted. And if they do have to meet up physically why should it be in London ? There are places far less crowded, easier to access, and more central to the UK than the south-east.

 

[Sid]

Our parliament doesn't gather in the capital either. So it wouldn't be unique if it were outside of London.

 

[Beebo Brink]

It's a popular opinion to disparage "career politicians" as a synonym for corruption, but what gets lost in that disdain is that legislating is actually a very demanding and complex profession. From all accounts that I've read of onboarding new legislators in the U.S., it can take their entire first year just to get oriented, to learn the rules, regulations and "how things are done" basics. They also learn a great deal from their more experienced peers, thus maintaining a body of institutional knowledge.

If you rotate every year, you get a mass of newbies wandering around asking "So where is the loo?" and "Are we allowed to do that?" and "Are you sure that's right?" while everyone stares back because they don't know the answer either. Then just as they finally get the hang of what they're doing, everyone leaves and you start the process all over again.

 

[Sid]

Being a politician is a profession already.
Same goes with judgements. So I'm happy we don't have a jury system. Only professional judges and strict rules about what is proof/evidence and what not.