John Bercow is itching to stop Brexit – and there isn’t much the government can do to get in his way

NB: He has a bit more spine than our Speakers, doesnt he? DS
When Charles I arrived in the chamber of the House of Commons in January 1642, armed guards in tow, to arrest a group of MPs for treason, it was the speaker who stood in his way. Instead of giving up the so-called traitors, speaker William Lenthall rebuked the King and reasserted the power of the Commons, telling Charles, “I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place but as this House is pleased to direct me.” The struggle for power between executive and legislature is not a new one. But the possibility of John Bercow taking the lead in the battle to stop Brexit offers the prospect of a modern-day stand-off, every bit as compelling as the one that took place in the months before the Civil War. It’s not Jeremy Corbyn, Yvette Cooper or Ken Clarke who’s best-placed to stop Brexit, but Bercow himself.

It’s an opportunity that Bercow plans to exploit to the full. The reaction from Bercow today to Boris Johnson’s plan to hold a Queen’s Speech in mid-October, with parliament not sitting for a period of almost five weeks beforehand, was telling. He took time out from his holiday with his family to fire off a vicious message, saying that the PM’s plan is a “constitutional outrage” and an “offence against the democratic process”... read more:
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-parliament-supended-no-deal-queens-speech-john-bercow-a9082651.html?utm_source=taboola&utm_medium=Feed

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