ONE of the pet phrases routinely trotted out in the West is that ‘we live in a democracy’.

Apparently we should all be eternally grateful that we live in a country where we can vote for our political leaders rather than be trapped by a dicatorship.

That is largely true. A dictatorship is not to be desired unless as was stated by my late father we could be run by a ‘benevolent dictator’, Looking back on those words of some 30 years ago now, I must agree although neither he nor I would feel confident to put that theory to the test.

What I would question now is our notion of ‘democracy’. One vote every five years – unless a government calls a poll earlier – and realistically only a choice of two electable parties doesn’t sound too democratic to me.

And that’s looking at the current situation with a glass half full. For more and more are realising – at least in my reality – that the difference between those two choices isn’t very broad.

We hear phrases such as ‘different sides of the same coin’ these days. And, yes, that’s my reality too.

But should we that surprised? After all, Conservative and Labour MPs along with every other elected representatiive, both swear an oath of allegiance to the same elite organisation – The Crown. They both, perhaps with slightly different thoughts, agree therefore to maintain the status quo. Even those who set themselves up to upset the apple cart have to ultimately conform in the same way. George Galloway, the vastly experienced and maverick former Labour MP, who won the Rochdale by election in a protest vote last week, has now pledged his allegiance to a power he sometimes rages against.

Speaking to ordinary people as I do every week with my job, this conversation is often brough up. And I’m finding that the most common answer to ‘how would you vote if there is a General Election tomorrow?’ is ‘I don’t know’.

These folk will then frequently say that, having lived through successive Tory and Labour governments over the years, they no longer believe that either will fix the nation’s problems. They empathise with the naivety of young voters who honestly think their vote is going to make a diference – but experience has told them otherwise.

I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the majority of these people eventually return to their first love – the party they have always voted for and obligingly jot their X in the same old box when the General Election is held, beit in May or the autumn.

But they will do so with a heavy heart.

For as I look back on changes of government during my years of being at least remotely interested in politics, it has always been a case of one of the two sides of the same coin becoming almost unelectable.

The strikes and despair of the mid to late 1970s made it almost impossible for Labour to mount an effective challenge to Margaret Thatcher in 1979. Then after she had won another two elections, her removal and the country’s general malaise made it a shoe in for Tony Blair’s so-called ‘New Labour’ in 1997. The only surprise being the change didn’t come five years earlier.

Then again Labour had clearly run out of ideas and money – the ultimate ‘will the last one out switch the light off’ when power switched back to the Tories, via an initial unsatisfactory coalition.

Fast forward to today and the comedy of errors made by the Government has the look of almost self destruct.

They will be asking us to elect a Prime Minister who was never elected in the first place and wasn’t even first choice among his own party members after the departure of Boris Johnson.

This may sound over bleak to some but, in my view, this is reality in the UK in 2024.

Belief in the democratic system is at an all-time low