If you were unkind or cynical, you could describe politics as a marriage of convenience between the science of government and the art of lying.
Politicians – as a group – are considered to be dishonest. “No shit, Sherlock”. Polling from 2020 found that most 79% of those who responded thought politicians were only truthful up to half of the time, with 42% believing that politicians were only truthful for a fifth of the time1.
In the same poll, 68% agreed that any politician who lied during the 2019 UK General Election campaign should be treated as having committed a criminal offence.
That’s not to single out politicians. Other professions considered to be equally untrustworthy include journalists, people who work in finance, advertisers and the civil service2.
But it’s one thing to complain about something and another to attempt to do something about it. Step forward Plaid Cymru’s Adam Price MS.
1. Compassion in Politics (2020). “Public agrees: politicians who deliberately lie should be treated as criminals”. Available at: https://www.compassioninpolitics.com/lying_politicians_criminals
2. Ipsos (23th October 2023). “Politicians the least trusted profession, while doctors the most trustworthy.” Available at: https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/politicians-least-trusted-profession-while-doctors-most-trustworthy
I want this to work (no, I’m not lying) – but banning politicians from lying is like trying to ban deep sea divers from breathing.
As demonstrated, politicians need to be able to lie regularly to do their jobs. If they didn’t, politics and democracy – as we’re accustomed to – doesn’t work. The 24 hour news cycle – which is heavily reliant on soundbites, gossip and behind-the-scenes intrigue – doesn’t work well under those conditions either. Politicians lie to get onto election candidate shortlists. They lie to get elected. They have to lie to constituents week after week. They have to lie to each other.
I’m not talking about the “whoppers” and “bullshit” that would result in someone falling foul of the Senedd’s proposals. That level of criminal deception and disinformation – which can be challenged in court – deserves a sanction. When it comes to “lying in politics” though, those kinds of lie are not the problem.
The most effective lies in politics are the lies we want to believe
If you have certain ideas or views about something/someone and see/hear something that supports those views, you’re more likely to believe it’s true – what’s called confirmation bias.
Politicians, campaigners and journalists know this. They can take a half-truth or a small bit of cherry-picked factual information and mould it to suit whatever message or campaign they’re trying to get out there.
It’s a legitimate political and campaigning tactic, but that makes it the kind of lying politicians need to constantly do. Hence the public may feel like politicians and journalists are untrustworthy or professional liars.
If politicians told the truth – without sugar coating, without pandering, without the occasional white lie – they would probably be even more disliked than they are now. They would be telling us a lot of things that were true, but we wouldn’t like.
The Welsh public needs a better “smell test”
The problem lies are the tiddlers, the spin, the half-truths: all those “dark arts of politics” lies that would pass through the net because they’re protected by free speech, protected by parliamentary privilege or are open to interpretation.
It’s every question not given a straight answer. It’s every time a public official only offers a small bit of the information they have at hand. It’s every public consultation launched when a decision has already been made. It’s every puffed-up piece of political theatre designed to tug at your heartstrings or make you rip your hair out. That kind of lying is more influential on opinions and election results.
If we want politicians to stop lying to each other and ourselves, then we need to become better at knowing when we’re being lied to and why. Call that “political literacy” or “media literacy” or whatever.
You can certainly pass laws to penalise criminal deception or fraud, but you can’t pass a law to stop people from believing a lie because they want to believe it. How many people reading this still think that Welsh water abstractions are worth billions of pounds?
This proposal threatens to be another in a long list of brave new devolved Welsh ideas that have noble – even transformative – intentions behind them, but stand little chance of making a difference because it’s very difficult to legislate cultural change. We have to want it.
At least someone’s trying though.
