Quote Originally Posted by the other bob wilson View Post
Bit of a side issue, but I've just been listening to a debate on 5 Live about the decision to relax the rules and allow male MPs not to wear ties if they don't want to. Perfectly sensible to me, but there were some phoning in saying that the change was indicative of the decline in standards we see in modern Britain and that if you start letting politicians dress sloppily, they start behaving sloppily.

Funny thing is, I'm pretty sure that back in the "scruffy" 60s and 70s, it was fairly common for MPs not to wear ties in Parliament. Having had to wear one all of the time in school I rebelled and never wore one when I started work - I was certainly not alone in going tieless back then either. Things started to change in the mid 80s when many people younger than me began to wear suits and ties to work and it became almost unheard of to see a male politician not wearing one - seems the pendulum has swung back again.
The story is that MPs were dressing smarter just as soon as the TV Cameras were allowed in.