TheSpeaker

In the UK we have many ancient traditions. One of these is that in our Parliament, the mother of parliaments, we have a Speaker of the House. His duty is to supervise the behavior of our elected representatives, the Members of Parliament.

The Speaker, once elected, becomes neutral to the political prejudices and party controls. He must be above reproach, have total integrity and possess the gravitas considered necessary to command respect from everyone in Parliament.

Normally the election of the Speaker is pretty much a certainty for the man or woman who has been considered a safe pair of hands by most Members. However these times are not normal.

The outgoing Speaker, Michael Martin, had to go because he had lost respect and control. He also had the misfortune to be in office when the whole political process unraveled; when many members of parliament have been found to be involved with varying degrees of dubious expense claims, malfeasance, fraud and inappropriate claims mostly born out of arrogance, greed and corruption of an epic scale.

Last week John Bercow was elected to the post of Speaker. I don’t know the man. I witnessed him make his successful pitch to be elected. I saw that he was most widely supported by his natural political foes in the Labour party, whereas his own party, the Conservatives, presently in opposition, appear to despise him. Ever since Bercow was elected there has been an outpouring of scorn and hatred aimed in his direction. One of the headlines in today’s Sunday Times is “Little Mr Turncoat in an awfully big chair” another is “The titchy Tory married to a leggy Labourite.” Another called him, "The Squeeker".

Make no mistake the man is hated with unreasoning hatred and vitriol. I have watched him in his new job and he hasn’t been outstanding but he has not been terrible either. Compared to his immediate predecessor he has been terrific.

So why have so many media pundits and highborn Conservatives evidenced such contempt, hate and scorn on John Bercow? I believe the answer is another ancient tradition in the UK. It is called anti-Semitism. Almost every negative article or opinion piece, and there has been many, stated that Bercow is pushy, duplicitous, greasy, short, over ambitious, oily and yes, you guessed it, Jewish.

To attack anyone in this manner is unacceptable and would be considered dangerous if this man were a Muslim or a black man but its OK to ascribe supposedly “Jewish” negative traits to the new Speaker. Judge Bercow for what he does now that he has fairly won his democratic election, not for what he is.

The closet anti-Semites who have run their despicable and demeaning whispering campaign against the man and the democratic process should crawl back under the slimy rock they usually inhabit.