Green Party’s Spencer says MPs are pissed on the job

In a new interview with Politics JOE, Green Party’s Hannah Spencer has spoken out against the drinking culture among British MPs:

"You can smell the alcohol when people are in between votes."

Green MP Hannah Spencer tells us what Westminster is REALLY like.

The full interview is live on YouTube, and as a podcast here: https://t.co/s4mKAc0xku pic.twitter.com/RcikszDxwQ

— PoliticsJOE (@PoliticsJOE_UK) April 26, 2026

As Spencer notes, the way things are in Westminster is not “how the world works”.

Green Party vs Booze Britain

Hannah Spencer is the Green Party MP who won the Gorton & Denton by-election. As we reported at the time, Spencer didn’t just win; she massively exceeded the most favourable predictions:

Gorton and Denton by-election result:

GRN: 40.7% (+27.5)
REF: 28.7% (+14.7)
LAB: 25.4% (-25.3)
CON: 1.9% (-6.0)
LDEM: 1.8% (-2.1)

Green GAIN from Labour.

— Britain Elects (@BritainElects) February 27, 2026

This is what Spencer said in her victory speech:

I didn’t grow up wanting to be a politician. I’m a plumber. And two weeks ago, during all this, I also qualified as a plasterer. Because even in chaos, even under pressure, I get things done.

I am no different to every single person here in this constituency. I work hard. That is what we do.

For most people outside the Westminster bubble, ‘working hard’ means ‘working sober’. This is obviously why Spencer finds the vibes in Parliament so hard to gel with.

In the interview with Politics JOE, Spencer said:

I’m really uneasy about – and I noticed this the other day – when you can smell the alcohol, when people are in between votes and everyone’s going in to vote. Some people have been drinking in between.

There’s a room where I walk past and I’ve doubled my back and looked in because people are just sat having a drink.

But again, that’s a job. I can’t imagine if a cleaner did that or someone working in a bank had a few drinks and then went back to work a bit smelling of alcohol – that wouldn’t happen.

Funnily enough, I’m well placed to comment on this. Many years ago, I worked as a cleaner at the Stretford Jobcentre. One day, a lady who I worked with turned up shitfaced. Several of the Jobcentre staff noticed, and told our boss to send her home. So basically, exactly what you’d expect to happen happened.

While I’ve never been a banker, I have worked in multiple offices, including a stint at a defence contractor when I was much younger and didn’t know any better. While people weren’t just walking around pissed, it was definitely the case that you could have a boozy lunch every so often without turning any heads (with all of it charged to your American Express card, no questions asked).

So yeah, Spencer is half right.

It’s definitely the case that most jobs are sober by demand, but the closer you get to the heart of capital, the more leeway you get to disobey the rules.

Dangers

Spencer also said:

And I think there’s been so many cases recently of questionable and dangerous behaviour… allegedly from MPs, with staff, because this culture… of a really unprofessional and worrying setting where people can just drink alcohol… while they’re in work; it’s like life doesn’t work like that.

And when I say that that is what I find very out of touch about that place, it’s things like that that I mean, because I just think the vast majority of us that have come from backgrounds of like normal jobs – like that’s not how the world works, so why does it work in somewhere where arguably the most important decisions are getting made.

Labour List spokesperson Stella Tsantekidou took offence to what Spencer said, complaining:

Yeah no, sorry, MPs are often cooped up in Parliament for 15 hours a day, they will have a drink with journalists or colleagues and will still be discussing politics -their job, as Hannah says.

Tesco workers are “cooped up” — you wouldn’t be okay with them getting on the lash, would you? Although I suppose they’re actually doing important work; they’re not just running some silly, little country.

Tsantekidou also said:

I don’t like the blanket demonisation of MPs and Hannah should know better after she had already been accused of not taking the job seriously because she took part in that dancing event in Portcullis house.

Spencer didn’t demonise all MPs; she demonised the ones who were drinking. Unless of course every MP besides her is drinking, in which case this is a bigger problem than we realised.

Tsantekidou added:

I hate people getting too drunk in Westminster too and am sad I see so many people seemingly with alcoholic addiction or otherwise, but just like all other professions socialise so do we in politics and it is an absolute necessity that you do.

People are responsible for their own actions, of course, but they’re less in control of themselves once they start drinking – i.e. having a bar at work is a recipe for trouble. Also, note that Tsantekidou is using ‘socialising’ as a synonym for ‘drinking’. This is increasingly not how people think, with people of all ages now drinking less to one degree or another.

Tsantekidou additionally said:

Politics is based on human relationships, not on some machine button being pushed. What should MPs do take journalists to sit and chat for hours in an empty room?

If the thought of chatting with colleagues drives you to drink, you might actually have a problem. Saying that, we do appreciate some of the ‘colleagues’ in this instance may be Jess Phillips or Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Professionalism

Tsantekidou finished:

Of anything there should be MORE socialising in politics so that people can understand each other better.

If she’s using ‘socialising’ to mean ‘drinking’ again, then no — we don’t need more politicians getting pissed with journalists. Clearly, we need both professions to start acting like professionals and to literally just do the jobs they’re paid to do.

Featured image via UK House of Commons