Gary's views

Gary's weekly views

Each week an article by Gary has appeared in the Plympton Plymstock and Ivybridge News in South West Devon. The articles are published here

PURPLE POWDER

I know ‘cos I was there. I saw the man lurch towards the edge of the gallery and start throwing his missiles. It all seemed to happen in slow motion. I saw him get away his one, two, three throws before the security officer, presumably just as startled as the rest of us, wrestled him back from the balcony. He was a good shot. I saw the purple powder hanging in the air and the look of stupefaction on so many faces. The Speaker immediately suspended the sitting and we all trooped out.

Most of us were very relaxed about it and trickled out chatting. Our Chief Whip started to bawl at us to get a move on. Nothing new there! Tony Blair and Michael Howard were as cool as cucumbers, the stuff, perhaps, that Prime Ministers are made of. After all we had seen it all before. In my time at Westminster we have had leaflets, lesbians on ropes and plenty of verbal incursions from the gallery above.

But as we started to amble back to our offices ten minutes early, the conversations and emotions became more serious. What if it had been some kind of toxic material, anthrax, sarin or ricin, say? Presumably, half the cabinet and plenty of others would now be struggling in intensive care?

There have always been protestors – fair enough. There have always been a troubled few, intent on their deluded missions. That’s a risk we all run and you can’t really guard against it. But since nine-eleven, everything has changed.

Now we KNOW for certain that there are out there a large group of people who have the motive, capacity and the intent to destroy our way of life. They brought down the twin towers, they brought down a Spanish government and they would be thrilled to do the same to us. As Bin laden recently said: “you love life but we love death.”
We all want to think that it will never happen to us, but what happened last week was a wake up call.

So what happens next? I expect that the professionals will now want to cloak us in even more security.

But it is vital that free access between the elected and those who elect is maintained. I do not want to do my job behind a plate glass screen. There must be a balance. But have we got it right?

posted by Nigel on Wednesday, June 02, 2004