Claire Fox

Forty a day for forty years – that’s a hell of a lot of cigarettes – but je ne regret rien. I loved smoking. But note the past tense because, eventually, for all the clichéd health reasons you can imagine, I had to give up. Despite always knowing it was a matter of life or death, I dreaded packing it in. Smoking has been so much part of my persona for decades; I just couldn’t imagine life without puffing away. All the usual smoking cessation options didn’t work, from gum to patches, Alan Carr to NHS counselling. Until eventually, on the recommendation of no less than two NHS doctors, I tried disposable vapes. Miracle upon miracle, they worked. And I am now a happy chain vaper. At last, I thought, I would stop being demonised for my bad habit.

Law-making is a funny old business. My move from commentator to legislator has brought with it some poacher-turned-gamekeeper quandaries. While all laws emanate from political choices, unlike my usual stomping ground of activist speeches or polemical articles, there is a danger that legal mis-speaking might end up criminalising people. I feel the need to ask a series of questions every time a Bill arrives at the House of Lords. Creating new laws increasingly seems to be a substitute for political leadership, so a key question must be: is this Bill really necessary? Is it proportionate? In an unelected part of parliament, is it anti-democratic over-reach to oppose illiberal legislation?

One of the trickiest challenges of being in politics is defending the rights of those we disagree with vehemently. That dilemma has never been truer than in deciding how to approach the Public Order Bill, now making its way through the House of Lords. How can I defend the right to protest when I have little sympathy for those protestors targeted by the Bill? Take Just Stop Oil. These catastrophising eco-warriors – whose nihilistic stunts are aimed at causing maximum chaos to the public – are a real menace. Their disdain for democratic change is evident in how little they care about hindering ordinary working people going about their daily lives. Alienating the public is the only thing they have achieved with their stunts.

Boris Johnson is rightly facing the wrath of Tory MPs over the proposed introduction of vaccine passports, but another piece of legislation put forward by the government should also trouble us. Critics of Boris Johnson’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, often focus on its scale. They have a point. The Bill is simply enormous: made up of 13 parts, 179 clauses and hundreds of pages, parliamentarians of all stripes have treated it as a Christmas tree, hanging on it an endless array of special interest amendments. But size isn’t the Bill’s biggest problem. Even if heavily amended, this act – which is going through parliament today and is set to become law next year – threatens to criminalise ordinary Brits.

In March this year, 35 years to the month since the end of the miners' strike, environmentalists were caught dressing up as miners. Their media stunt was intended to protest against a proposed expansion to the Bradley coal mine in County Durham. Martin Raine, a real miner working at the site, was quoted saying: ‘It is our jobs at stake here and instead of allowing us a voice the BBC showed fake miners with fake cardboard helmets and interviewed a student bussed in by Extinction Rebellion who got the basic facts wrong.’ Miners (and former miners) are no more likely to join eco-protests against mining jobs than Thatcherites are to sign up to Extinction Rebellion.

Is the new normal here to stay? For the sake of our parliamentary democracy, let's hope not.  There is little doubt that holding the Government to account has been made harder by the imposition of restrictions during the pandemic. During the Covid crisis, politicians have been too keen to treat parliament as a normal workplace; the truth is that it isn't and never will be.  If ever there was a good excuse for an 'us versus them' rule exemption, surely it would have been to honour the public by ensuring scrutiny and pushback against the Government removing people’s liberties so easily. Instead, parliamentary proceedings have taken the hybrid form of in-person and Zoom proceedings. This is an unhappy compromise for which we are all worse off.

British TV viewers have never had so many channels to watch, yet they've also never had so little choice. The Brexit referendum exposed this lack of political diversity all too clearly. As a panellist on Radio 4’s The Moral Maze for 20 years, I suppose I was something of a BBC luvvie. No doubt I was still seen as a bit of a maverick by some, but I was accepted on the media scene. However, when I casually mentioned back in 2016 that I was going to vote Leave, things changed.  'But you’re an intelligent, well-educated person, Claire', said one senior producer. From that moment on, in studios and green rooms, I was greeted with a familiar sneer. From my position of privilege, it was hardly a problem.

The lockdown has ensured that many millions now gather round the TV and watch the daily press conference from No.10. We hang on every word from politicians and medical/scientific experts, trying to read the runes of our fate for the next hours, days, months. These people are leading the country’s response to Covid-19. A third group in the room (be that virtually), whose leadership should be indispensable, are the press, charged with asking penetrating, crucial questions on our behalf. This should be when the nation feels the latest strategy is being held to account and scrutinised, when more light is shone on controversial decisions that affect our livelihoods and liberty, even life and death.

I have enjoyed my first fortnight back as a civilian after my temporary stint as an MEP. Along with other Brexit party representatives, we had one job, and we did it. I am rather proud of my modest contribution to bringing democracy home. Looking back at my experience as an MEP, there are lessons worth noting. I had assumed that a gathering of 700 or so MEPs from all around Europe, would, at the very least, provide a fascinating exchange of views from an international perspective. But the parliament operates through artificially federalised political groupings; behind closed doors the leaders of each grouping carve up who gets to speak, for how long (typically 60 seconds), and in stage-managed terms.

When Labour leadership challenger Jess Phillips urged men to 'pass the mic' to a woman on the top job, telling Sky’s Sophy Ridge it would 'look bad' if Labour failed to elect a woman, she more or less admitted not being up to the job. Surely the weakest argument any leadership candidate could use is demanding a step-up based on their sex? In effect, Phillips is trying to knock out the leading candidate, Keir Starmer, because he’s a man. We heard a similar argument on Question Time last week. When Laurence Fox was asked who he preferred as the Labour leader, he replied 'Keir Starmer – he just looks like he can take Boris on quite well.