MPs should be worrying about more than trust - May 5, 2010

Briefing Paper from the Hansard Society and the Political Studies Association

What's Trust Got To Do With It?

On the day leading politicians go head to head on the BBC to debate trust in politics, a new Briefing Paper, What's Trust Got To Do With It?, argues that public dissatisfaction with politics is based on deeper problems than lack of trust in MPs and Parliament. The Paper identifies the more urgent challenge as being the decline in the relevance of politicians and political institutions to people's everyday lives.

What's Trust Got To Do With It? highlights the fact that distrust of politicians is long-standing -  pre-expenses research in 2004 showed 27% of the public trusted politicians ‘a great deal' or ‘a fair amount'; the same question asked post-expenses in 2009 showed a marginal decline in trust to 26%.  The expenses scandal did not therefore lead to a collapse in trust in politics and politicians because levels of trust were already so low. In addition, for a majority of the public (53%) allegiance to a political party overrides perceptions of wrong-doing by candidates - they would still vote for them.

The Briefing Paper identifies declining rates of satisfaction with the country's system of governance as a major challenge for politicians - while 60% of the public think Parliament ‘is worthwhile', only 19% see it as an influential institution in their everyday lives. Furthermore, 85% of the public believe they have ‘not very much influence' or ‘no influence at all' over national decision-making. This perceived lack of influence is rooted primarily in the belief that politicians do not listen to what the public has to say and that the political system does not allow them to have influence.

What's Trust Got To Do With It? recommends that MPs should concentrate on reforms to tackle lost satisfaction, relevance and influence rather than trying to address trust. Policies introduced to address issues of trust through the provision of greater transparency and accountability (such as Freedom of Information legislation) often have the opposite, unintended effect of engendering a culture of suspicion rather than trust.

Dr Ruth Fox, Director of the Hansard Society's Parliament & Government programme and author of What's Trust Got To Do With It?, commented: ‘The events of the past year have opened up an opportunity for a serious dialogue about what kind of representative democracy we want for the future. Politicians, by focusing on policies designed to engender trust, have missed the bigger, broader underlying concern - the declining levels of public satisfaction, perceived influence on decision-making and confidence in the relevance of Parliament to their lives. MPs in the new Parliament must tackle essential questions about the role and function of politicians and Parliament - if it's just business as usual, public attitudes to politics and Parliament may plummet still further.'

Dr Alix Kelso of the Political Studies Association, said: 'In any future debate about the role of politicians and Parliament the academic research community has a key part to play in ensuring that its findings are better disseminated to the wider world in order to improve the context of that public debate. Researchers across the country are doing important and valuable work exploring, for example, the role of trust in public life, how the public view ethical standards in politics, the efficacy of parliament, and the nature of modern citizenship. The findings of this research can help better inform debate about the public's understanding of the MP's role, and help ensure that politicians focus on what may make the most difference in improving public attitudes to politics and Parliament in the future.'

For further information, contact Virginia Gibbons, Head of Communications at the Hansard Society on mediaprog@hansard.lse.ac.uk

 or 020 7438 1225 or 07812 765 552

Editor's Notes

• What's Trust Got To Do With It? - a Briefing Paper examining public trust in and expectations of politicians and Parliament draws on the latest academic research about public trust, politics and Parliament and is based on working group discussions conducted by the Hansard Society, the Political Studies Association (PSA) and the Centre for Citizenship, Globalization and Governance (C2G2) at the University of Southampton.