美国国家公共电台 NPR--Boris Johnson tried to chip away at Britain's checks and balances — he failed

Boris Johnson tried to chip away at Britain's checks and balances — he failed

Transcript¹

Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson tried to undermine the country's democratic system of checks and balances. But the system — and voters — fought back.

A MART?NEZ, HOST:

By some measures, democracy has been in decline around the globe for more than a decade. Today, we offer a glimmer² of hope from across the pond, where former Prime Minister Boris Johnson tried to chip away at Britain's checks and balances during his time in office. The system fought back. Frank Langfitt, NPR's global democracy correspondent, reports from London.

FRANK LANGFITT, BYLINE³: As crowds gathered for King Charles' coronation last month, protesters began to unload a van filled with hundreds of signs that read, Not My King. Before they could hand out a single sign, police arrested them. Many Britons cherish their right to protest, and some politicians condemned⁴ the arrests. Among those detained was Graham Smith, leader of the anti-monarchy group Republic. He spoke⁵ to Piers⁶ Morgan.

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GRAHAM SMITH: This was a direct attack on democracy because democracy requires the freedom to dissent⁷.

LANGFITT: Police were using a controversial new law that allows them to detain people based on the mere⁸ suspicion that they'll lock themselves together or to things to cause disruption. Here's Smith speaking to Britain's Times Radio.

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SMITH: If they wanted to advertise how awful and draconian⁹ this legislation was, they couldn't have picked a better target than us. We have a very good, strong track record of being a peaceful, law-abiding campaign.

LANGFITT: Shami Chakrabarti serves in the House of Lords with the opposition¹⁰ Labour Party. She sees the new law as a sort of thought crime.

SHAMI CHAKRABARTI: You can imagine how dangerous it is in a democracy for the police to have blanket powers to stop and search people without even a reasonable suspicion that that person is going with criminal intent.

LANGFITT: Police couldn't prove their case, and Smith was released without charge. But the government defended the law, which was introduced under Boris Johnson. During his three years as prime minister, Johnson targeted various checks on his power - tried to shut down parliament, sell off a public TV network and weakened the country's electoral watchdog. William Wallace is a lawmaker with the Liberal Democrats¹¹, another opposition party.

WILLIAM WALLACE: He was behaving as if he was world king, as he used to describe himself, and that the conventional constraints¹² of the British Constitution didn't apply.

LANGFITT: Soon after taking office in 2019, Johnson tried to close down the legislature, which would have prevented lawmakers from scrutinizing¹³ his Brexit bill. Britain's Supreme¹⁴ Court overruled Johnson, called the move unlawful. The prime minister responded with populist rhetoric¹⁵ and cast the dispute as an us-versus-them conflict.

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PRIME MINISTER BORIS JOHNSON: We will not betray the people who sent us here. We will not. We will not. That's what they want to do. We will not abandon the priorities that matter to the public, and we will continue to challenge those opposition parties to uphold democracy.

LANGFITT: In his telling, Johnson represented the will of the people to push through Brexit, against judges, opposition politicians and lawyers, a sort of liberal British deep state. Sam Fowles is an attorney who helped argue for Parliament's reinstatement before the Supreme Court. Fowles recalls stepping into a cab after the ruling and hearing news of the verdict on the radio.

SAM FOWLES: And we were kind of nudging each other and very smug and very happy. And the cabbie turned round to us and looked me dead in the eye and said, the British people will never forgive you for what you've just done. And that brought home to me that there is such a disconnect in this country between what is actually required for democracy and what is actually going on.

LANGFITT: Britain's democratic system is particularly vulnerable to attack by those who simply ignore the norms.

TIM TARRANT: We don't have a constitution in the U.K. We don't have formal written rules about a lot of these things.

LANGFITT: Tim Tarrant works at the Institute for Government, a London think tank.

TARRANT: There is this phrase that the U.K. system relies on good chaps. It relies on people who are willing to behave. And if someone is willing to misbehave, then there is very little that the system can do to curtail¹⁶ that.

LANGFITT: Johnson continued to attack checks on political power. Last year, he called for the government to sell off Channel 4, an aggressive, editorially independent broadcaster. The government argued Channel 4 could better compete with the help of private finance, but many saw the move as pure revenge. During the 2019 election campaign, Channel 4 embarrassed Johnson during a debate on climate change. Jane Bonham-Carter of the House of Lords explains.

JANE BONHAM-CARTER: It was a famous incident when Boris Johnson did not turn up to a Channel 4 program, and he was replaced with a block of ice. It was an attempt at showing that he didn't understand about global warming. And there is a theory that Channel 4 was never forgiven for doing this.

LANGFITT: Bonham-Carter says Johnson's government wanted to cripple the broadcaster.

BONHAM-CARTER: They saw it as a channel that was intrinsically opposed to them.

LANGFITT: The House of Lords had major problems with the plan, which eventually died. While in office, Johnson did succeed in undermining some forms of public accountability. For instance, the Electoral Commission was stripped of its power to file criminal cases over election law violations¹⁷. Many also saw this as political payback. In the past, the Electoral Commission had hit the Conservative Party and Johnson's pro-Brexit referendum campaign with huge fines for violating campaign finance laws. But overall, the British system has proven resilient. Tony Travers is a professor of government at the London School of Economics.

TONY TRAVERS: In the end, in a mature democracy, these institutions think, well, unless we stand up for ourselves, it doesn't really matter. There's no point in existing, so we might as well do it anyway.

LANGFITT: Johnson ultimately failed due to self-inflicted wounds. Last summer, lawmakers in his own Conservative Party pressured him to resign as prime minister. They feared his lies about government get-togethers that violated COVID restrictions¹⁸ would cost them at the polls. A committee report has ruled that Johnson did lie to Parliament, and he resigned last week from the legislature. Brian Klaas is a political scientist at University College London.

BRIAN KLAAS: There's been erosions of democracy in the time I've been here in Britain. There's no question about that. But there's been more punch back from the forces of institutional order and from the voters that are punishing those who actually do this.

LANGFITT: And, Klaas says, that's one reason why the Conservative Party, which Johnson recently dominated, is on track to lose the next election by a big margin¹⁹.

Frank Langfitt, NPR News, London.

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1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 glimmer   

v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光

参考例句：

• I looked at her and felt a glimmer of hope.我注视她，感到了一线希望。
• A glimmer of amusement showed in her eyes.她的眼中露出一丝笑意。

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 condemned   

adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He condemned the hypocrisy of those politicians who do one thing and say another. 他谴责了那些说一套做一套的政客的虚伪。
• The policy has been condemned as a regressive step. 这项政策被认为是一种倒退而受到谴责。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 piers   

n.水上平台( pier的名词复数 )；（常设有娱乐场所的）突堤；柱子；墙墩

参考例句：

• Most road bridges have piers rising out of the vally. 很多公路桥的桥墩是从河谷里建造起来的。 来自辞典例句
• At these piers coasters and landing-craft would be able to discharge at all states of tide. 沿岸航行的海船和登陆艇，不论潮汐如何涨落，都能在这种码头上卸载。 来自辞典例句

7 dissent   

n./v.不同意，持异议

参考例句：

• It is too late now to make any dissent.现在提出异议太晚了。
• He felt her shoulders gave a wriggle of dissent.他感到她的肩膀因为不同意而动了一下。

8 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

9 draconian   

adj.严苛的；苛刻的；严酷的；龙一样的

参考例句：

• You can't expect the people to obey such draconian regulations.你不能指望人民服从如此严苛的规定。
• The city needs a draconian way of dealing with robbers.这个城市需要一个严苛的办法来对付强盗。

10 opposition   

n.反对，敌对

参考例句：

• The party leader is facing opposition in his own backyard.该党领袖在自己的党內遇到了反对。
• The police tried to break down the prisoner's opposition.警察设法制住了那个囚犯的反抗。

11 democrats   

n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The Democrats held a pep rally on Capitol Hill yesterday. 民主党昨天在国会山召开了竞选誓师大会。
• The democrats organize a filibuster in the senate. 民主党党员组织了阻挠议事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 constraints   

强制( constraint的名词复数 )； 限制； 约束

参考例句：

• Data and constraints can easily be changed to test theories. 信息库中的数据和限制条件可以轻易地改变以检验假设。 来自英汉非文学 - 科学史
• What are the constraints that each of these imply for any design? 这每种产品的要求和约束对于设计意味着什么？ 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

13 scrutinizing   

v.仔细检查，详审( scrutinize的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• His grandfather's stern eyes were scrutinizing him, and Chueh-hui felt his face reddening. 祖父的严厉的眼光射在他的脸上。 来自汉英文学 - 家（1-26） - 家（1-26）
• The machine hushed, extraction and injection nozzles poised, scrutinizing its targets. 机器“嘘”地一声静了下来，输入输出管道各就各位，检查着它的目标。 来自互联网

14 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

15 rhetoric   

n.修辞学，浮夸之言语

参考例句：

• Do you know something about rhetoric?你懂点修辞学吗？
• Behind all the rhetoric,his relations with the army are dangerously poised.在冠冕堂皇的言辞背后，他和军队的关系岌岌可危。

16 curtail   

vt.截短，缩短；削减

参考例句：

• The government hopes to curtail public spending.政府希望缩减公共事业开支。
• The minister had to curtail his visit.部长不得不缩短访问日期。

17 violations   

违反( violation的名词复数 )； 冒犯； 违反（行为、事例）； 强奸

参考例句：

• This is one of the commonest traffic violations. 这是常见的违反交通规则之例。
• These violations of the code must cease forthwith. 这些违犯法规的行为必须立即停止。

18 restrictions   

约束( restriction的名词复数 )； 管制； 制约因素； 带限制性的条件（或规则）

参考例句：

• I found the restrictions irksome. 我对那些限制感到很烦。
• a snaggle of restrictions 杂乱无章的种种限制

19 margin   

n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘

参考例句：

• We allowed a margin of 20 minutes in catching the train.我们有20分钟的余地赶火车。
• The village is situated at the margin of a forest.村子位于森林的边缘。