Will the King’s Speech herald a new approach to politics?

Hours after polls closed in the general election, as the scale of Labour’s majority became clear, Sir Keir Starmer’s victory speech contained a striking observation: “The fight for trust,” he said, “is the battle that defines our age.” This week, Sir Keir has a chance to prove that he means business, amid all the pomp and ceremony of the King’s Speech. Last year's ran to 1,223 words and was the longest monarch's speech for nearly 20 years. Will that be topped on Wednesday?

Labour put ethical government at the heart of its manifesto pledges, and Full Fact would like to see the King’s Speech turn positive talk into action. It looks set to be a bumper speech with at least 30 bills, including an AI bill, and others related to housebuilding, green energy, crime and voter registration. There might be some surprises in store. 

For our part, we will be keeping a close eye on any proposals related to politicians’ behaviour, tackling misinformation, protecting democracy and that ‘battle’ to restore trust. According to Ipsos, only nine per cent of the British public trust politicians to tell the truth, making them the least trusted profession in the country. That has to change.

It starts with politicians keeping the promises they make. During the election period we fact checked each of the manifestos and looked at the extent to which they met our manifesto standards, but we also considered whether any of the policy proposals aligned with our own.

In that vein, what would we like to see in terms of new legislative proposals?

First and foremost, we want the new government to commit to making the Ministerial Code statutory, and require ministers to use public data responsibly.

The Labour manifesto promised to establish a new “independent Ethics and Integrity Commission'' and to “restore confidence in government and ensure ministers are held to the highest standards.” When we wrote to Sir Keir Starmer on 5 July we called on him to prioritise setting up the commission, to make the terms of reference open to scrutiny, and make his ministerial code statutory. Furthermore it should be robustly independent, and accountable to parliament. However in an interview on 10 July he implied that some of the thinking in this sphere was yet to evolve, for example saying that he remained “unsure” how to enable Sir Laurie Magnus, the Independent Adviser on Ministers’ Interests, to initiate his own investigations. Solving this conundrum should be an early priority. We must move on from a world in which a Prime Minister is able to effectively mark his own homework. 

Trust in politics and in our democratic system has also fallen because so many people struggle to know what they can believe in the information they encounter online. Labour’s manifesto committed to “explore further measures to keep everyone safe online”, but failed to mention the important work of fact checkers in tackling misinformation. An AI bill, if it appears, will be relevant here. There was some focus in the manifesto on foreign interference and disinformation - with a pledge to tackle “misinformation campaigns which seek to subvert our democracy”, but this needs further fleshing out and it will be interesting to see if it appears in the potential AI bill, or in an elections bill.

We are disappointed that media literacy so far appears to be low on the new government’s radar, and will be looking closely for any mention of it in the King’s Speech. Good media literacy is an essential tool to help the public detect bad information. A nationally representative survey carried out by Ipsos UK and Full Fact in December 2023 indicated that one in four UK adults finds it difficult to distinguish true information from false information, and that one in three adults had falsely believed a news story was real until they found out it was fake. 

Full Fact is active in this policy space. We successfully campaigned for amendments to the Online Safety Act on media literacy, and have been pleased to sit on Ofcom’s Making Sense of Media advisory panel for the past few years. The government must commit significant funds to ensure that the whole population gains the skills to deal with bad information online. Read more about what Full Fact wants to see from the next phase of online safety legislation.  

Whatever appears in the King’s Speech, Full Fact will be working with our new government to ensure that all the above issues are at the forefront of its policy agenda. We want to increase trust in politics, not diminish it - and politicians have to take the lead.