The Best Club

During recent late-night debates in the House of Commons, some Tory M.P.s were "half-drunk" and "disgusting to look at." As a result, "they not only hindered debate but threatened the whole purpose of having a Parliament."

These fighting words were uttered at an informal Labor Party get-together in Yorkshire by Socialist M.P. Patrick Duffy, 44, a former lecturer in economics at Leeds University. Later, he continued his lecture in the press, discussing Parliament's several bars, which are exempt from the strict (11 p.m.) closing hours of commercial pubs. Offending

M.P.s, Duffy insisted without naming names, "look upon Parliament as a club with unrivaled bar facilities. I want the whole question of their conduct brought out into the open. The last censure debate was reduced to a farce by Opposition Members' coming in straight from the bar and creating virtual chaos."

The outraged Tories rose in Parliament to defend not only their bar facilities but their honor, accusing Duffy of committing a "breach of privilege" --an act of disrespect to Parliament itself. Laborites and Tories joined in passing Duffy's indiscretion to Parliament's Committee of Privileges, no doubt mindful of George Bernard Shaw, who observed 50 years ago in Major Barbara that it is, after all, whisky that "enables Parliament to do things at 11 at night that no sane person would do at 11 in the morning."

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