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[from TimesOnline, by Struan Robertson]

They say that there are two things you should never see made: laws and sausages. As a tiny group of MPs debated the Digital Economy Act this week, the stomachs of an online audience turned.

This was an Act passed on the votes of hundreds of MPs who didn't even attend those debates and proposed by politicians whose correspondence showed a lack of understanding of even the most basic terms used in the debate.

This law should never have been passed. Regardless of your view on whether copyright infringing websites should be blocked or infringing users cut off from the internet, this was no way to pass such a controversial and sweeping piece of legislation.

It was subjected to the 'wash up' process, a pre-election rush-through designed to pass uncontroversial, uncontested Bills before Parliaments dissolve. It is not meant for a law like this one.

This is a law which will introduce powers that could see households or coffee shops disconnected from the web on accusations of file-sharing and internet service providers forced to block access to websites that are deemed likely to infringe copyright. Nobody knows how these powers will be used because the detail is unwritten.

It is a powerful law, one that rules on some fairly basic digital rights and has potentially massive implications for citizens and businesses alike.

Yet very few MPs turned up for the hurried debates. Far more turned up afterwards, just to vote it through.

The debates were watched live online and silently heckled by thousands of Twitter users, many of whom were witnessing the strange operation of the Parliamentary machine for the very first time. They named and shamed the MPs who did not show; they accused most speakers of failing to understand all things digital; they applauded the law's most informed critic, Labour's Tom Watson, who was tweeting from the backbenches; and they vented their frustration at being unable to stop the machine. Perhaps these feelings will be reflected in ballot boxes on 6 May.

MPs from all parties acknowledged that the Bill was faulty yet they pledged their support for its passage. Shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt called it "a weak, dithering and incompetent attempt to breathe life into Britain's digital economy." But Hunt voted for it. He said that if the Conservatives come to power, his party will fix any problems with the Bill, "if it turns out that the legislation is flawed." That is not the way to make a law.

Whether you supported the Act's principles or not, they are undeniably significant. It deserved proper debate and proper scrutiny but it received neither. It should not have been passed.

UPDATE