LONDON -- The British general-election campaign has started. The "spin doctors" are working overtime to show the party leaders and party policies in the best possible light and to provide good photo opportunities to illustrate their leaders' popular appeal. At the same time, the party leaders themselves have been trying, with the help of their spin doctors and speechwriters, to produce appealing "sound bites."

Television and the Internet are suitable media for such brief clips, but are less well adapted to detailed statements of policies or full and informed debates. One consequence is that the electoral focus tends to be more on personalities than on policies.

Sir Edward Heath, the former prime minister, now in his 80s and in the last Parliament "father of the House of Commons," is retiring at this election. In his farewell speech on May 9, he expressed dismay at the way the House of Commons has been downgraded by recent governments, especially the current Labor government. Far too frequently the government has bypassed the House by making policy announcements in other forums and not in the House, as has been the tradition in Britain. Ministers and their civil servants are often irritated by the investigations of House of Commons committees, and on a number of occasions critical reports have been rejected or ignored by the ministers and their departments in a way that shows or implies contempt for Parliament.