I attended the 'hustings' in the Parish Church yesterday afternoon. The five candidates sat and did not stand, behind a table before us. There was the current Member of Parliament, a Conservative, one of the 513 guilty men, a young Labour student careerist, a nice but clueless Liberal young man, a Ukip guy, a small businessman, and a Green tax inspector, who was as certain as any Jehovah's Witness that the end is high, and that the only answer is, of course, more taxation and more regulation.
But the strangest thing about the hustings was that neither barracking, nor asking questions was allowed. All ten questions were decided by who knows what power, but certainly not by us. So we had polite discourse on immigration, the deficit, and the development of the town centre.
But the burning issues of the day - those that get people hot under the collar - nothing, zilch.
The Green woman tried to raise global warming, Trident, and the bombing of Libya and the Ukip guy tried to raise the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
There were no questions concerning Equal Marriage, nuclear power, Scottish independence, our membership of the European Union. Nobody expressed an opinion on abortion or child sex education.
Nobody expressed an opinion about press censorship or the end of free speech.
Because, of course, free speech is dead.
Five years ago, at the hustings, people asked questions from the floor. I remember, a lady, a social worker asking about children's services. I didn't share her slant, but it was her thing, her passion.
But this free expression is no longer allowed.
Such is the fear that someone may say something Offensive, that the police may be involved, that all passion, all opinion, all controversy must be prevented.
And so we are silenced.
We got a vague idea about the candidates' competence and their commitment to the locality, but that was it.
Democracy or no, when debate is silenced we live in a Tyranny.
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