A useful constitutional device that could be harmonised across the EU

I must stop watching Prime Minister’s Questions live (on the Daily Politics show) on Wednesday lunchtimes as it always gives me indigestion.

For the second week running not one MP raised the issue most annoying the general population - the employment by MPs of relatives on the public payroll. Dennis Skinner, supposedly a moral leader on this issue and someone who can normally be relied upon to ask awkward questions, sat absolutely silent. Banal parish pump issues (the prevalence of counterfeit cigarettes in south Yorkshire, infringements of the Green Belt in particular constituencies etc) were batted to and fro for the full half hour, and then the PM was away.

What can be done when legislators conspire to ignore and defraud the people they are supposed to serve?

Perhaps our European partners offer a clue? In the Platz am Hof in Vienna an enraged crowd in 1848 dragged one of the government ministers from his office and hanged him from a lamp-post. It seems a useful constitutional device that could be harmonised across the EU.

More on Dennis Skinner: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Skinner

More on the lamp-post hanging of officials:
In Austria - http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9400E2DA1438E233A25756C2A9629C94639ED7CF&oref=slogin
In France - http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/imaging/essays/censerhunt1.html
And even in India - http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/mar/08msg.htm

PS apologies to those who find British politics boring.