Press releases

John McDonnell MP to host The People’s Parliament

30th January 2014

The People’s Parliament

Hosted by John McDonnell MP

A series of panel discussions, open to the public and involving many high-profile speakers is to take place in Parliament beginning on Monday 3rd February.

Speaking on the first panel is Owen Jones (journalist), David Graeber (academic), Mark Serwotka (General Secretary PCS), Caroline Lucas MP with John McDonnell MP in the chair. The title of the event is “What sort of democracy do we need?”.

 

The series of talks are centred around the theme of creating a ‘People’s Parliament’. The idea behind the initiative is for a range of people to be invited to speak on a subject in which they are a specialist in order to foster debate about the state of the country, the political scene more broadly and to encourage discussion around a progressive agenda which addresses these issues.

 

Other speakers and groups include Michael Mansfield QC, George Monbiot, Ben Goldacre, Liz Davies, UK Uncut, Greenpeace, Crisis, Richard Murphy, Gareth Pierce and Michael Chessum. Each discussion will be chaired by a current MP.

 

John McDonnell MP said:

 

“With 14 months to go before the next election, we should be entering a period of intensive debate about the state of the country and the politics we want for the future. This hasn’t taken off yet and usually the last place to look for this is in parliament itself, with its often sterile knockabout politics. However, the meeting rooms are there and we are going to use them to bring some real politics to parliament. You never know,  it might even infect the Commons chamber itself.”

 
For more details click here