Memorandum by Mr R Johnston (HON 11)
I have been reading in the Guardian and
on the teletext that your Committee is looking into reforming
the awarding of honours. I have no idea if you are taking submissions
from members of the public but this letter is my input to the
debate.
First of all may I say I am not in favour of
scrapping the system completely. I think it is good to award someone
for all their hard work and dedication to a job or voluntary work.
I also think that the word Empire may well be outmoded in today's
world but any replacement must take into account the value of
the award that it is giving the credit of the nation to that person.
As someone who has tried a few times to access
the system to gain awards for people who I think are deserving
of an award I would like to make a number of points.
Over the years I have nominated a few people
for awards the first time I did it was under Mrs Thatcher's period
of Prime Minister. As far as I know at the time all you had to
do was send a letter to the PMs office nominating someone. You
then received a reply saying the PM would consider your nomination.
One never knew if it was your nomination or someone else's that
made that nomination successful or whether it was just thrown
in the bin. An example is the case of Gerry Fitt who became Lord
Fitt. On the day of his announcement of retiring from Northern
Ireland politics I wrote to Mrs. Thatcher asking he be nominated
for a peerage. Now he received a peerage but was that because
of me or because it was in the gift of Mrs Thatcher to give it.
I don't know and will never know now.
Similarly with Lisa Potts. Again, on the day
she was shown to be a hero in saving children I wrote to John
Major asking she be given the George Medal for her bravery. Eventually
she was awarded that Honour. But between my nomination on the
very first day and her award The Daily Mail ran a campaign to
get her an award. Again I have no idea what affect my letter had
but it does appear that large scale lobbying is the answer to
the latter example.
When the New Labour Government was elected they
promised changes to the system and to their credit they did. However
I thought that when they came to power more would be made of the
ordinary members of the public getting awards. Yes I know that
a lot of the awards go to ordinary men or women but they are the
minor awards OBE, MBE. I thought the honouring of showbusiness
personalities, sports stars, donors to various party funds would
be given short shrift. How wrong I was!
It is this, I am afraid that really annoys me.
To see the likes of Mick Jagger, Sean Connery, Michael Caine and
many other show business people be awarded Knighthoods not because
they deserve them but because they touted for them in the press
is an affront to all the people who work their socks off for years
in low paid or voluntary work. I am aware that Connery gives a
lot of money to charities in Scotland but then he doesn't pay
British taxes either, as it seems many recipients of honours seem
not to do. Similarly with pop stars that are getting honours that
seems to the public that they are getting them not for charity
work but for the amount they earn.
What right does Colin Blakemore have to be indignant
because he was passed over for a knighthood. According to the
Guardian's report today on his evidence to your committee he considered
resigning. How nice for him. He is doing a job and apparently
he is only doing it to get a knighthood.
In changing the way the honours system works
as the Labour Government did; it became a mystery to all of us.
For instance I sent off all the necessary forms to nominate someone
who is a hard working dedicated member of the teaching profession
who has done so much for the school that she heads as Headteacher.
I was told that the more letters I got together to support the
nomination the better. Why? The more letters I get people to write
the more the chance is that the person I am nominating will find
out what I am doing. Also, once I send in these nomination letters
that is the last I hear of the matter, so I don't know if my nomination
was successful or not until I see that person receive an Honour.
I never know if that person has turned down the offer or not so
I might keep sending in the nomination letters unaware of the
situation. That is a ridiculous way to run a system.
You have a committee to look at and recommend
who deserves an honour. I know that they then make inquiries locally
as to the worthiness of the person nominated. Why then does it
matter how many people send in support letters.
Having done all this you then discover that
if you scored a goal at a rugby match you don't need nomination
forms and support letters you just need a PM who thinks that not
only you but the whole team deserves an individual honour and
it is this, that to my mind is denigrating the system to such
a point that the public feel the whole Honours system should be
scrapped.
As I said at the beginning I don't really want
the system scrapped I would like to see changes though.
1. Any nomination is considered on it's
merits not on how many letters of support or lobbying by media
are sent in or how much money someone has donated to a particular
party.
2. Those nominating someone be kept informed
as to how their nomination is progressing in the system.
3. Consider that even an ordinary member
of the public frequently deserves a higher honour than an MBE/OBE.
Knight/Damehoods shouldn't only be given to those who are wealthy
and think they are in a higher pecking order than the rest of
us.
4. Differentiate between groups I think
deserves some merit, but not to the exclusion of some from the
country's highest honours to some.
January 2004
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