"...all those statues of the great and the good – not one of whom believed in Democracy!”

Tony Benn, about the statues in the Houses of Parliament

Do the buildings, interiors, objects and ceremonies of the Houses of Parliament actively prohibit democracy from functioning? The building was designed, to an intense level of detail, in a period in which the concept of full franchise was continually rejected by the ruling elite. The design of the site has not much changed- has its function? Or is it still, as its language implies, a home of hierarchies, non-democratic systems, and unelected elites? Are we still looking at a house built for the protagonists in a story of rule through rotten borough? 'PUGIN TRAINS: Deconstructing the Houses of Parliament' explores the languages and systems in Westminster that promote or prevent democracy today. "