A Swords Length in the Commons

White House Hotel
London

We continued on from the House of Lords through the Central Lobby which is the lobby that lies between both of the houses of parliament. Their constitution provides that any constituent, at any time can come into this lobby and demand to see their representative. These days of course “lobbying” is a bit more organized then strolling in unannounced.

My favorite story our guide told was about the organization and running of the place itself. The story is about the carpets on the center of the floor in the House of Commons. On the carpets on each side of the house running parallel with the benches is a 6in. [or so] wide red stripe. One of the rules of the House is that the members while standing and speaking cannot cross beyond this red line. These red lines run parallel to one another on each the government and opposition sides of the house. The design was such that these lines are exactly the two sword lengths apart, for reasons that may not be so obvious today, unless one understands that parliment has been meeting in this location since being offered the space by King Edward VI in 1547.

Once we had a look at the House of Commons, including its new bullet-proof glass screen sectioning off the visitors benches, we made our way back in to the Central Lobby. We were fortunate enough to have included our group of fellow Churchillite from the New York, Randall Baker. Through a club of his he made the acquaintance of a one Nigel Evans, MP. Nigel was good enough to stand in the Central Lobby with us, answering a few questions and introducing us to a few interesting colleagues.

He first introduced us to David Lammy, the Cabinet Minister who heads up the Ministry of Culture. I can see how one would vote for David Lammy to represent their constituency, as he was immediately very engaging and likable. He commented on the fact that in America we have The National Endowment for the Arts and in the UK they have an entire ministry dedicated to culture.

Next Nigel introduced us to a former colleague of the House of Commons, now sitting in the House of Lords. Lord Brookside and Evans had obviously known each other for quite some time and had quite an interesting and humorous repartee. Evans mentioned that Lord Brookside had voted against the measure to ban foxhunting, and Brookside responded, “Yes and my two daughters nearly disowned me over it. They got on their boots and went out to the hunt and lay out in the field to stop the hunts.” He then went on to say that his family and colleagues have taken to calling him “Tally-Ho Brookside.”

The measure passed of course…