A Vote for Peace and Quiet

Alexander Waugh, grandson of novelist Evelyn Waugh, says Britain's hung election results show voters wanted to stop incompetent politicians from pushing unnecessary laws.

Strong government is the same as bossy government. Yet the British people, who hate being pushed around, have been surprisingly slow to spot this. For thirty years we have had strong, bossy governments. Margaret Thatcher, who commanded a large majority in the House of Commons, passed over 1700 fatuous and petty laws a year during her time in office, while Tony Blair, whose majority was at times even bigger than Thatcher's, put over 2600 new laws through parliament in each year that he was prime minister. We are, as a result, grossly over-regulated, and quite fed up with being patronized and pushed about by self-righteous, meddlesome and very incompetent lawmakers. The hung-parliament result was a great victory for the British electorate whose only real desire was to clip the wings of its political class and to slow down the vomit rate of Westminster's legislative machine. A little bit of political peace and quiet—that is all we voted for, and that is what we may, at least for the time being, expect to get.

Alexander Waugh is the grandson of Evelyn Waugh and the son of columnist Auberon Waugh. He has written several books, including, most recently, The House of Wittgenstein, Fathers and Sons, and God. He lives in Somerset, England, with his wife and three children.

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