Today, I’m mourning the failure of a tradition older than myself to transmit onto it’s children – a tradition that surely would have brought many constructive advantages to this land, as well as satisfying less essential needs.

One-hundred-and-eight years, four months and three days ago, a tradition that should have been an heirloom from a mother to its child was not passed on. I’m speaking of the rowdy, good-humoured British parliamentary manners that the Commonwealth of Australia’s Houses of Parliament never inherited.

In my politically-biased view, key demonstrators of this legislative semi-casualness are the former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and current Leader of the Opposition, David Cameron. Take a look at this debate from June last year, concerning a possible second vote for the Republic of Ireland on the EU Treaty of Lisbon after they initially voted “no”:

Or Margaret Thatcher’s statement in October 1990 to the House of Commons regarding the European Council meeting at Rome:

And this is probably the closest Australia gets:

I mean, how much more would kids be interested in Parliament if it had more humour?

Maybe I’m just a supernerd…

The British House of Commons, equivalent to the Australian House of Representatives