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Communications Allowance

I am glad that I allowed the hon. Gentleman to intervene at that point. I mentioned that the communications allowance came in on the back of Lord Puttnam's commission's work on Parliament and communications, which concluded that both the institution and MPs needed to be better equipped to communicate with the public about the workings of democracy. It is surely irrefutable in principle that MPs need to offer their constituents some account of their activities in both the House and the constituency. In the light of longer-term voting trends and in the immediate aftermath of the expenses scandal, surely such accountability is more important than ever before. We have to rebuild the trust between politicians and the people, and one of the ways in which we can do that is by explaining what we do. In practice, unless MPs do it, no one will. It is a fact of life across all media, including local media, that there has been a decline in the reporting of Parliament, yet it is good for democracy that people should know what their MPs have been doing in Parliament and that, from time to time, they have succeeded in bringing benefits to their constituencies.