I have long held the belief that it is incumbent upon Members of Parliament to debate issues in the House with courtesy and to consider the impact the language we may use has. If we do not respect each other in the Chamber why should people respect us outside it?
The scenes of angry mobs surrounding politicians, hurling vile abuse, that we have seen again recently remind me of some of the darkest days of Brexit. Of course I appreciate people may well be very angry, but our democracy is better than that.
On Wednesday I hosted an event in Parliament for Girlguiding, at which the young women there (and the ones who joined online) proved that young people are perfectly capable of debating today's issues articulately and politely. They were absolutely brilliant, and had a meaningful discussion about online abuse. Girlguiding is the UK's largest charity for girls and young women and does fantastic work advocating for them, so it was quite depressing to get a warning at the start of the event that I may not want to mention them on social media because of the trolling it would provoke.
This week has seen a mini reshuffle during which my whip was promoted out of the whips office. This was annoying on two levels, I'd just done an interview for the BBC about the whipping system in which I said he was the best whip I've ever had. So I now potentially have to redo the interview whilst not knowing who his replacement is. I hope it's not a downgrade.
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