House of Commons Hansard Debates for 7 Mar 1990

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Lobbyists are often engaged by local councils and some of them are beyond reproach--for example, the lobby known as the Coalfield Communities Campaign, which gives us good briefings on subsidence and pit closures. That is an excellent organisation to which I do not object.

Then there are the surreptitious organisations, which are far more sophisticated now than they were in the early 1970s. I was telephoned by a film producer who wanted to make an advertisement showing the man who winds up Big Ben wearing a Timex watch. He asked me to arrange for this man to be filmed going downstairs and checking his watch before looking up at Big Ben.

Miss World used to tour this place. Stephen McAdden went around asking people to have lunch with her. That guaranteed Mecca pictures in the newspapers and publicity for the Miss World competition. I do not object to that, either, because the public knew about it. We can never stop lobbying or money changing hands. It has gone on for hundreds of years, but the public, the local party, the voters and the media must know about it. If all these people know, we should not witness the sort of events that took place earlier this week in the Arthur Scargill case. Everything will be on the record, and if someone says he is in favour of something on television we should be able to know whether the organisation that he favours has contributed to his expenses--and that includes trade union officials. I-- like all trade-union sponsored Members--always mention in my election address that I am sponsored by the National Union of Railwaymen. If I did not, the NUR would ask me why I did not.

The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) made one of the most pompous speeches that I have heard in many years, and said not a word about the British School of Motoring giving £300,000 to the Liberal party two or three years ago--that was revealed to no one. The Liberals moved amendments to related Bills and still said nothing about that money.

Mr. Simon Hughes : It is true that I and my colleagues have always accepted that parties should register where they get their money from. If there was such a rule, we would comply with it.

Mr. Ashton : The hon. Gentleman has virtually admitted what I said ; he has certainly not denied it.

After I was censured by the House, there was nothing that I could do. The affair was very embarrassing to my constituency party, coming as it did just before an election. It left a stain on my character for ever. Three years later Maudling, Roberts and Cordle were proved not to have declared interests and to have been available for hire. The House censured them, and Cordle quit. I never received a pardon and nobody ever said that my character was quite clean. I never bothered asking for a pardon.

It is not easy to draw a line and say that a pound above that line must be declared. Also, it is not easy to police the measures that my hon. Friends seek. It means that somebody has to point the finger, and all hon. Members are reluctant to do that. I did not point the finger. I said that the place was clean and offenders could be counted on the fingers of one hand. None of us wants the opprobrium of being called a grass or a fink. I was accused of that by some of the people who were involved.

How do we find out unless some journalist or "World in Action" make it their business to find out? We have moved on from Members being paid or being asked. What

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did the Saudis get for their £88,000? Nobody has ever found out. We have moved on to a much more professional public relations lobbyist system, and it is in that context that we have to approach the problem. People must be made to pay a bond to register, and they must be prepared to be investigated and to be above suspicion. People must be told, "If you do anything inside this place that you do not reveal to the Select Committee on Members' Interests, we will take away your bond and your permission to come in here." If we do that, we will begin to clean it up.

8.22 pm

Mr. John Biffen (Shropshire, North) : The hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) has spoken with commendable candour and realism about the whole question of lobbying. I hope to follow him, at least in the sense of being realistic in my assessment of the unhappy case that we are discussing.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House opened the debate with a quiet dignity that encapsulated the sombre judgment that we have to make on the unhappy situation with which the House, happily, is not that familiar. Make no mistake : this is a House of Commons judgment and we have to ring-fence it. One of the least happy aspects of the whole case has been the trial by tabloids of my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Mr. Browne) over past weeks and months. It has been done in a way that has made the Shropshire luminary Judge Jeffreys seem like a lilac social worker.

We have to accept a few salient points in this task of discriminating judgment. The first and most important is that mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester at the start of the debate when he accepted the findings of the Select Committee that there had been non-declaration in the instances that had been identified and the implied strictures that there had been a dereliction of responsibility under the resolutions of the House, and expressed regret. I appreciated that gesture and judgment on the part of my hon. Friend. It has made the conduct of the debate infinitely easier in circumstances that are disagreeable to us all.

I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Sir G. Johnson Smith) and his Committee, because they had to carry out an immensely difficult task. I wholly endorse the confidence that my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden expressed in the members of his Committee. That is a relatively easy part of my speech, but I now enter much greater difficulty in trying to make the judgment that is implicit upon me, no less than on all other Members.

I come to the debate convinced that, whereas the resolution of the House mechanism might be tolerably effective for the gathering of information to compile the Register of Interests, it is a thoroughly unsatisfactory mechanism for conducting the investigation that has occupied the Committee over the past few months. I do not know whether we should use the analogy of a court, but to most of us it seems that, effectively, we are being asked to be a jury and pass a judgment in the light of its findings. Therefore, there is bound to be a legal analogy whether it is appropriate or not, and for the purposes of understanding our task, I think that it is appropriate.

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I make that observation as if it is something that I have stumbled across in recent days, but practically every hon. Member who has spoken in the debate is conscious of the inadequacies of the procedures that were available to my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden and his Committee in the discharge of their duty. That is also implicit in the second motion moved by my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House. It implies that the whole business needs further attention, to see whether we can improve upon our mechanisms and procedures.

To show my respect for the Committee I shall refer to paragraph 9 of its report. It says that the Select Committee did not

"provide any guidance as to the admissibility of evidence or the period of time over which complaints might be considered." That was in the context of the most serious allegations relating to business activities in 1981 and 1982.

The House has heard speeches that have dwelt upon the difficulties of my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester in not having the facilities that he would have had to argue his case in a legal framework before a court. One could make that observation from any point on the political spectrum, because this is truly a House of Commons matter and a judgment about the difficulties in which we find ourselves. It is against that thoroughly unsatisfactory background that I have to make a judgment and none of the proceedings helps me. My hon. Friend the Member for Winchester has admitted that he did not declare his interests in the instances identified by the Committee. Therefore, there is no question of guilt or not, if I may use a rather heavily loaded word. The infringement--which is perhaps a better word--is admitted. It is not contested.

We have to judge the appropriate punishment for that degree of infringement, and here we would have been much advised if my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House could have given some insight about what he judged to have been the motive for the behaviour of my hon. Friend. Such an assessment from the Committee, if it had felt able to make it, would also have been useful, but I appreciate that its members did not feel that they were in a position to make these judgments. The judgment about motive is crucial before choosing any of the range of punishments presented to us on the Order Paper.

I do not understand the law through any formal education, but my sense of natural justice tells me that before we go for the heavier punishments there must be a clear and demonstrable proof of motive. There must be a demonstration that the assets registered were somehow or other handled in a more acceptable way than the assets and interests that were not registered. No attempt has been made to distinguish between the areas where my hon. Friend registered and those where he did not. One is perfectly entitled to assume that the same broad commercial and political judgment was exercised in both cases. That means that one comes back on any concept of natural justice to suppose that the matter was a consequence not of sinister or mendacious judgment, but of foolish and ill-judged behaviour. That, I think, is not an over-generous judgment on my part. Indeed, any other judgment would prove to be unduly harsh and would not operate in any normal process of law. Therefore, I conclude this part of my few remarks by saying that, on due reflection, I shall vote for the amendment in the name of my hon. Friend the Member

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for Calder Valley (Mr. Thompson), which endorses and acknowledges what my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester said about his infringement of the House of Commons resolution governing the Register. Once one goes to a higher scale of judgment, one is judging motive, for which there is no adequate evidence.

The second motion, in the name of my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House, captures the anxiety of the House that the present arrangements are unsatisfactory and need the further attention of hon. Members. Inevitably, and especially in the light of our own experience of this trial--if I may use that word--there will be a growing interest in using the normal legal processes and seeing whether what happens in local government could be a guide to our parliamentary actions.

Clearly, my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath) was not enamoured of that possibility. I quite understand that the difficulties of finding an effective legal formula are immensely formidable --they have been considered by the House on previous occasions--but unless we proceed along the lines suggested by the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), it will always be there as the tempting softer option never adequately considered by the House. So I welcome what my right hon. Friend said.

I hope that the further consideration that the House gives these matters will take into account how tangibly and effectively we may try to bring them within the ambit of the law rather than rely upon the present processes, which we have seen at some discount tonight. However, we should travel cautiously. I opened my remarks by picking up the realism of the hon. Member for Bassetlaw, and I shall conclude in the same vein : in this sphere it is very easy to aspire, but damnably difficult to deliver.

8.32 pm

Mr. Bob Cryer (Bradford, South) : I should like, first, to make it clear that the Committee entered into this task, instructed by the House, with meticulous care and scrupulousness. All members of the Committee resented the implication--indeed, the expression--by the hon. and learned Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) that, somehow, because of our political views, we were prejudiced against the hon. Member for Winchester (Mr. Browne). I suspect that, in fact, because of political differences, we leaned over backwards to try to eradicate any shade of prejudice from the examination of the evidence that was presented, on which we were required to make a judgment for presentation to the House for its consideration.

I can say, without fear of contradiction by any member of the Committee, that the Committee meticulously, scrupulously and lengthily checked every assertion and cross-assertion made by those who gave evidence, including the hon. Member for Winchester, David Leigh, the complainant, and the other people who were brought into the ambit of the examination. The Committee had to spend a minimum of an extra 20 or 30 hours going over and over the ground, at the request of members, to make sure that it had not dealt unfairly with the hon. Gentleman. Therefore, any implication, or expression, that the Committee entered into the debate on a partisan or shoddy basis, in any shape or form, would be completely and utterly untrue.

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Indeed, in my case at any rate, it would also be deeply and bitterly resented. I did not want to do the job. That is not what I became a member of the Committee to do ; I became a member because, as everybody knows, I am interested in commercial lobbying organisations here. This task just happened to be given to the Committee by the House of Commons. It is very interesting that in this House there is always the rubric that we are all hon. Members, yet every word of the hon. and learned Member for Burton suggested that, in the conduct of our affairs, we were dishonourable Members. I resent that. The hon. Gentleman might at least have given the members of the Committee the same credit as he attempted to give the hon. Member for Winchester.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) suggested that we should have a framework of legislation and recourse to the courts. That would be a detailed framework, and it would shrug off from this House the obligation to examine any case in which a complaint had been made about a Member. I suggest that that would be a very much harsher regime, as this House tends to deal in a very kindly fashion with Members that it feels have transgressed in any way. It does so by going over the information in the most scrupulous way.

Mr. Winnick : Does my hon. Friend agree that some kind of apology is required from the hon. and learned Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence), who clearly made the point--the whole House heard it--that my hon. Friends the Members for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) and for Workington (Mr. Campbell- Savours), because of political bias, were simply incapable of doing properly their job on Committee? In those circumstances, does not the hon. and learned Member for Burton consider it appropriate to make an apology?

Mr. Cryer : I am not interested in securing an apology from anybody ; I simply want to set the record absolutely straight. I suspect the brutality of exchanges from some Members, particularly when they are based on a completely incorrect examination and understanding of the work that the Committee did. I just want to put the record absolutely straight lest anyone here tonight should think that there was any validity in some of the accusations--indeed, all of the accusations--of the hon. and learned Member for Burton.

Mr. Lawrence : I am not surprised that neither the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) nor the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) was listening to my speech. I do not expect them to listen to me. I most certainly did not say that anybody, from whatever party, on the Committee was dishonourable. I said--and I am grateful for the opportunity to make the point again--that when one comes to consider who one's judges should be, one cannot expect, in a court of law, to have sitting in judgment somebody who may at some time in his life have manifested some bias against one, for whatever reason. That is precisely what natural justice means. If a judge has a difference of approach, whether political, legal, or of any other kind, the normal procedure is for that judge not to sit.

Mr. Cryer : If one were to work on the basis of the sort of sympathies that the hon. and learned Member for Burton was trying to assess --and on every occasion on which the Committee sat there was a large majority of

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Conservative Members--it could just as easily be concluded that the Committee was prejudiced overwhelmingly in favour of the hon. Member for Winchester. As a matter of fact, I do not take that view. My view is that all the Committee's members, of whatever political persuasion, including the Liberal Member, tried as objectively as possible--as objectively as any member of the judiciary, and, bearing in mind the strangeness of some members of the judiciary, a good deal more so- -to examine the matter impartially, in some cases leaning over backwards to make sure that the accusations that some felt would be forthcoming could not, in any legitimate way, be sustained.

Given that the Committee concluded that the omissions to register interests were serious in two instances and that in others the recommendation was that no action should be taken, I believe that 20 days' suspension, including the unprecedented withholding of salary, matches to some degree the seriousness of the omissions, but I would have made a longer suspension incumbent. If the House is to make a serious issue of the obligation of registration, it must be seen to do something.

I share the concern about the removal of constituents' representation in this place. Expulsion would not be part of my consideration and I would vote against it. As many have said, that is a matter for the constituents of the Member concerned and not for us. There are some disagreeable precedents where a Parliament has tried to make a judgment on a Member's membership.

A Member who is suspended has a mark of disapproval from Parliament which can be taken into account by his or her constituents. The Member can still carry out his or her duties to a degree--he or she can still see Ministers and other Members as well as constituents. The constituents are not deprived entirely of the services of their Member. That being so, it seems to me that Parliament has to make some mark of its disapproval of the breach of the rules of this place.

There is the argument that the rules are not especially clear and cannot be followed easily. I remind hon. Members that we introduce rules for ordinary citizens of a complexity and length which would baffle every hon. Member. I am not talking about sums such as £50,000, which many millions of our fellow citizens would regard as a dream. Many people regard sums of that sort as unrealisable. We tell those who are making claims of £40, £45 or £50 a week that they must supply information of intricate detail--and woe betide them if they fail to provide the information which the forms request. For example, housing benefit is often only £10 or £12 a week. Given the large sums that the Select Committee was called upon to discuss, it might regard £10 or £12 a week as paltry. In many terms such sums are paltry, but for so many of our fellow citizens housing benefit is a lifeline in their struggle and scrape each week for existence.

We in this place do not say that we can overlook any lapse on the part of those outside who fail to give the information that is required of them. We do not say, "Well, they are difficult rules. If you do not provide the information, we shall shrug our shoulders, let it go by and say that it should not happen again."

There should not be double standards. It seems that there is one standard for Members of this place : we are

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prepared to say of them that there could have been an oversight. There is another standard, however, for those outside this place for whom we legislate and for whom we provide scrupulous rules. We are all aware of the statutory instruments and delegated legislation that we produce for the social security system. The pile stands at least a foot high. The legislation is designed to ensure that every penny that is paid is properly expended and that there is no cheating. If we do that for our fellow citizens outside this place, the same standards can reasonably be expected to be operated in this place. But that is not the position.

We formulate rules that have no criminal penalties attached to them, and this is the only place in the country that provides criminal sanctions. We have decided that we shall not apply criminal penalties to ourselves, but we apply them to people outside. If we introduce modest rules that must be followed and we find that there are transgressions, surely we must demonstrate that we do not have double standards--one standard for us and another for those outside.

Mr. Barry Field (Isle of Wight) : Is the hon. Gentleman seriously suggesting that taxpayers' money was involved in the matters that we are considering?

Mr. Cryer : The hon. Gentleman is right to make it clear that taxpayers' money was not involved. We have provided, however, that money from whatever source must be subject to a declaration. The position is the same whether money is taken from the public purse for a training school which is run by an hon. Member or whether there is payment by the Saudi Arabian Government, for example. We say that there must be a declaration. Although my parallel is not absolutely apt--the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Field) was right to take up the issue of taxpayers' money, and I do not grumble about that--it is valid when it comes to the rules, in the application of which we have been generous.

I shall remind the hon. Member for Isle of Wight how the rules came to be introduced. There was pressure from within the House. When I was first elected to this place in 1974, the first question that I tabled was about the registration of Members' interests. I told my constituents that I wanted to see a register established. A senior Labour Member came to me and said, "Don't worry, old boy, we know the wrong'uns in here. We can pick them out. We do not need a register. In any event, a register will never come to pass."

In fact, it came to pass because this place was brought into disrepute by the Poulson scandal, which erupted throughout the nation. The nation's response was to say, "Parliament must do something about this." We cannot lurch from crisis to crisis every 15 to 20 years when evidence of corruption comes to light, only to say, "We must tighten the rules." Once we establish rules, we must be certain that we apply them properly and consistently. that must be the mark of integrity and honesty of this place.

Mr. Benn : The parallel that deals with the question of the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Field) is that if an office of profit under the British Crown disqualifies, an office of profit under the Saudi Arabian crown should similarly disqualify. That is the question that the House must consider.

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Mr. Cryer : My right hon. Friend makes an interesting comment, as always.

There is another example of double standards. It is an illustration that may interest the hon. Member for Isle of Wight. We have fairly sloppy rules about the declaration of Members' interests, but we tell councillors that they must observe tight rules. How did those rules arise? They came into being when the House was propelled to produce the Register of Members' Interests. That was the result of the Poulson scandal, the tentacles of which spread to virtually every local authority. Parliament said that local authorities should be subject to tight rules, but we introduced fairly generous rules for ourselves. That was not right.

Members of the public are elected to local authorities for a variety of reasons. Some seek election because they think, wrongly, that election will add to their prestige. Most people, whatever their party view, want to do well by their fellow citizens. Surely it is wrong that those who set out with the best of intentions should have placed upon them obligations which we have chosen to shrug off when it comes to the first test of our rules. We say that there are other and better ways of proceeding. There may be, but we set up the rules. At the first hurdle we are talking about a new inquiry. We say that the procedures are inadequate, along with the Select Committee itself, and that we cannot and should not do anything.

I think that we can and should do something. At the very least we should exhibit our concern as a House for what I regard as a deliberate and mendacious failure to register. I accept that that is not the view of the Committee. The Committee left the matter open, although there are implications of concern in the report. Given the nature of the Committee and the way in which it constructed and compiled the report, I believe that there should be a suspension. I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) put down his amendment.

Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : Is it not right that under the present rules an hon. Member is entitled either to register his interests or to decline to do so? Therefore, is it not fatuous for the House, whatever else it has done, to say, "You failed to do what you did not have to do"?

Mr. Cryer : That is the Powell argument, and that has gone by. In any case, it is not true to suppose that, if a Member failed to register, he would not be in the position that we are discussing. If there had been a complaint about a business interest of the Member, the fact that he had failed to register would not have prevented the Select Committee from having an investigation and reporting the matter to the House for debate. So that is completely erroneous. I do not want to go into detail, but at the beginning the hon. Gentleman was asked whether he had a conscientious objection to registration and he made it clear that he had not. So the whole question of the Powell position is not relevant to the debate. Failure to act may be delayed until pressure builds up, but it will bring the House into disrepute. We are concerned about people outside. I think that they want hon. Members to follow at least some portion of the standards that we expect of them. Therefore, I support the main proposal of the Leader of the House.

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The registration of commercial lobbying organisations has been raised. I have mentioned the Poulson affair several times. When it broke, the Government of the day set up a Royal Commission, chaired by Lord Salmon, to report on standards of conduct in public life. The report has never been debated, which is a serious omission by the House. It made one recommendation for Members of Parliament which has been shrugged off. No crisis has erupted, so we have been able to put it to one side. The Royal Commission recommended that bribery of a Member of Parliament should be made a criminal offence. It is not. That is something we should remedy.

As you know, Mr. Speaker, for many years I have been putting forward a private Member's Bill to register commercial lobbying organisations so that we can keep track of what they do. We should give the House of Commons Commission power to draw up guidelines so that, if the rules are breached, they can be thrown out. My Bill would implement a recommendation made as long ago as 1976. People outside would then see that we did not have double standards and that we had just one standard of justice--rules to be followed by everyone. That would be the fairest way of dealing with the problem. Several Hon. Members rose --

Mr. Speaker : Most of the hon. Gentlemen who have risen have been here throughout the debate. I should like to be able to call them all. May I ask for brief contributions, perhaps 10 minutes or even less?

8.53 pm

Mr. David Wilshire (Spelthorne) : I rise with great trepidation, partly because a cold has robbed me of part of my voice and partly because, as many hon. Members have said, it is easy in a debate like this to sound sanctimonious or trite. However, I am so disturbed by some of the issues that I feel compelled to speak, new as I am to the House.

The first point which disturbs me was eloquently covered by the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), who said that there was a growing cry of corruption levelled at the House of Commons. I do not believe that that is justified, but that is not the point--we have to take seriously the fact that the cry is being heard, and we have to nip it in the bud. I want to speak up because I have heard the cry before.

I was in local government before I came to the House and I know what happened there following the Poulson scandal. I assure all hon. Members that it was no fun chairing a planning committee, as I did, after that scandal. I did not enjoy being criticised publicly because my wife, my children and I continued to swim in the swimming pool of my next-door neighbour, who happened to be a developer. That is the level to which it went. I sense that the same may happen here in the near future if we are not careful. My constituent, my hon. and learned Friend, the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence), said that he smelled a whiff of a search for a scapegoat. So do I.

The hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) observed that we are all being tarred with the same brush. I suspect that all of us who have canvassed have had the same accusation levelled at us, irrespective of party. There is guilt by association if we do nothing. The ultimate result, so eloquently expressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath), may be over-reaction and an invasion of privacy.

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It would be absurd, but I would be interested if someone could tell me the relevance of my registering my one share in Bristol City football club. There are those who would go that far. What I saw in local government when there was over-reaction was a loss of many good people who cared about the community and who wished to serve, but who found that the pressures were too great, and left.

I also saw a lowering of public esteem due to guilt by association. I believe that the loss of people from local government and the lowering of public esteem had a great deal to do with the problems now facing local government, so heaven help us if Parliament loses its special place in the minds of the public. That is why I believe that the matter is important and why we have to act now.

When, at 10 o'clock, we all have to decide how to act, we have to resolve a dilemma. How do we send the correct signal to the public at large about the conduct of the House, while at the same time making sure that justice is done to an individual colleague? If democracy is to survive, the public have a right to expect us to set an example by all of us being above reproach. If we are to go on insisting that Edmund Burke was right and that we are here not as mere voting machines on behalf of our party but as individuals to use our judgment, and to be sound and independent in our decisions, we must not only be seen to be sound and independent--we must be able to prove it. The conclusion that I draw from the report is that our procedures do not make it easy for us to prove that we are independent and sound in our judgment.

It is in that context that my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester in making an admission about errors of judgment, leaves us with an important matter on which we must act and which we cannot duck. It follows that if somebody stands here, as my hon. Friend did today, and apologises for an error of judgment, we can no longer say that we can safely ignore that report. We must do something. If the facts in that report and its conclusions are correct, we must all make it crystal clear to the country that we expect the highest standards from all of us.

That leads me to the other part of my dilemma. Who in this place should decide whether the facts and the conclusions are correct? The more I have thought about that before the debate and while I have been sitting here since 4 o'clock, the less clear I have become about who should take that decision. I have reached a stage where I am sure now about just one thing-- the full House is most certainly not the right place to take some of the decisions being put before us. Why do I believe that? Surely a cornerstone of democratic justice in any country is that the politicians who write the rules must not be responsible for enforcing them or for interpreting them, lest we become judge and jury in our own cause, and that is to undermine democracy.

Who are the right people? It depends what sort of matter we are facing. Are we discussing criminal wrongdoing, political wrongdoing, moral wrongdoing or perhaps just the one thing that has been admitted--the making of an error of judgment?

If we wish to pursue the question of criminal wrongdoing, the answer is simple. The House should send the report to the Director of Public Prosecutions. We

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could then step back and let him get on with it. That is the only way in which criminality can be dealt with in a matter of this sort. On the other hand, if we wish to say that there may be some element of political wrongdoing in all of this, we should again simply step back and say that it is for the selectors and electors of Winchester to take action, not for the House.

If we wish to pursue the notion of moral wrongdoing, we must take great care that we do not seek to turn the House into a court of morals. I see moral judgments as a matter for every individual in Britain, not just 650 of them. It is not for the House to reach a collective moral judgment about a colleague or anyone else. All that we can do today is to act as individuals, reach our own individual conclusion and make that conclusion public. That is as far as an individual can go in making moral judgments of this sort. Where does that leave me? It leaves me wanting to uphold the high standards of the House so that we do not bring it into disrepute. I want to leave any further discussion of criminality for the Director of Public Prosecutions and to leave any further consideration of political action to the selectors and electors of Winchester. What am I then left with? I am left with an admission of an error of judgment and with a growing feeling, which other hon. Members have also expressed, that the rules that we have here are not clear enough. I conclude that those are the only things on which we dare take action--an admission of an error of judgment and an admission that our rules need looking at.

In those circumstances, the amendment in the name of the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) requesting the Speaker to express our displeasure is as far as we dare go on the matter. I equally believe that we should accept the proposal from the Leader of the House that the rules of this place should be tightened up. I shall therefore be voting accordingly on both motions.

9.3 pm

Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) : It is not the hon. Member for Winchester (Mr. Browne) who is on trial today--it is the ethics of the House of Commons. I say that purely because of the experience of many hon. Members on both sides of the House in local government. Local government never finds itself in the one-off situation of effectively trying one of its own members in its own council chamber. That is because the rules are clear, tight and, as many hon. Members have pointed out--from my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) to the right hon. Member for Shropshire, North (Mr. Biffen)--the rules are enshrined in law. Whether the House reaches a decision today or on another occasion, that is how the matter will ultimately be resolved.

In looking at an individual Member tonight, we are looking at a symptom rather than the cause of the problems that have beset the Select Committee on Members' Interests for the past year, during part of which time I was a member of that Committee.

The hon. Member for Winchester finds himself in the present position because we do not know the interests that all hon. Members have. Any person who puts himself or herself in the firing line by seeking to represent the local population in Parliament takes on many responsibilities.

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Interests cannot be hidden. Indeed, to a large degree we give up our privacy. There is no separation between our public and private lives. We are on trial all the time.

That becomes obvious when we start pretending that there is a division between what we seek to do as individuals in terms of making money and what we do in our political lives here. That is why I have reservations about the concept of something being a House of Commons matter. There is no such thing that is neutral and above the political fray, be it crude party politics or the wider politics that we practise in Parliament.

Political, party and policy issues are at stake today. We on the Opposition Benches should state clearly that a Labour Government would act differently in relation to the Register of Members' Interests. In saying that, I leave aside the case that is in our minds today. We would take a different view from that of the present Government towards the register. Labour Members can express opinions on behalf of a wider public, who expect more from their Members of Parliament in this era of television and radio.

The public should know exactly what the Members they elect get up to. We must concentrate on prevention rather than cure. Rather than one of our number being dragged through the extremely invidious experience that the hon. Member for Winchester is undergoing, there should be clear ground rules to prevent such a case from ever reaching this point, which means total disclosure.

My view on that was made clear in the amendment which stands in my name but which, sadly, was not selected. Many of the ideas contained in it are not new. They are common currency in France, America, Canada and Australia. Legislatures elsewhere in the world take such principles in their stride. We could learn from the best practices of those legislatures and create a really effective register here so that all hon. Members are clear where their duty lies before coming to Parliament and while they are here. There would then be no errors of judgment.

The right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath)--God bless him- -drew attention to some of my proposals. For example, I believe in full- time Members. I find that there are never enough hours in the week to enable me properly to do my one job here, let alone service other organisations, companies, directorships and consultancies outside. I see no reason why all directorships and consultancies, and the remuneration therefrom, should not be declared openly in the Register of Members' Interests. The clients of consultancies should also be listed, and the remuneration therefrom, so that it could never be said, "You are getting money underhandedly because of your activities in the House of Commons," through parliamentary questions, comments in the Chamber or whatever. All shareholdings and dealings should be listed. The present Register means that a Member could sell all his or her shares on one day, register the next day as having no shareholdings and then buy back the same shares or others the day after. That would accord with the concept of the Register.

Mr. Rooker : Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Allen : If my hon. Friend will allow me to continue

Mr. Rooker : That is absolutely wrong. My hon. Friend must appreciate that any change in the circumstances does

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not outweigh the details published in the Register, because it is updated daily. There is a requirement that if there is a change of circumstances it must be registered at the time. My hon. Friend must get the record right. Let us not do ourselves down more than we need to.

Mr. Allen : Without checking for myself, I will take my hon. Friend's intervention at its face value and I am glad to do so. I believe that the Register should include hon. Members who are involved with Lloyd's syndicates, and that the entries should provide the public with clear information about whether and to what extent hon. and right hon. Members have benefited personally from any legislation with which they were involved. There have been a number of cases where hon. Members have gone on to benefit--for example, when voting for a privatisation. Minister who, on appointment, divert shareholdings into trusts should be required to declare those shareholdings and to identify any relatives with a beneficial interest in such a trust.

I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield has amplified in his amendment, which has been selected, the fact that the Representation of the People Act should be amended so that people who become parliamentary candidates understand that they will have to make a full and total declaration of their shareholdings and all their interests and that failure to do so would be in breach of a rule of the House and in breach of the law of the land. They would thus disqualify themselves from Parliament without any intervention from some kangaroo court which might be constituted in this place. I believe that the Act will have to be amended in that way sooner or later.

I was particularly interested in the concept of the well-rounded Member of Parliament--the idea that poor people such as myself, who work here full time, do not have the necessary depth of personality and that it would do us a lot of good to have a couple of directorships in the city, or perhaps to spend five or six hours a day in the law courts to give us a better view of the world. Mrs. Llin Golding (Newcastle-under-Lyme) rose --

Mr. Allen : My hon. Friend may intervene if she wishes. Ideally, Members of Parliament should take up this position of honour and trust as full-time employment. The House deserves nothing less, and the electors whom we are here to represent deserve nothing less. That day will come--and the sooner the better.

9.13 pm

Sir Nicholas Fairbairn (Perth and Kinross) : It is all very well to say that this is not a trial, but it is. We are the High Court of Parliament and we are trying my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Mr. Browne) whether we like to say so or not.

I do not wish to appear on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester. I am not willing to judge whether his admissions or his follies were right or wrong.

As someone who believes in the concept of justice, and in the House of Commons, I am horrified that we should adopt a procedure whose nature is contrary to justice. We have set up a Committee because of what in Scotland would be called a clype--[ Hon. Members :-- "A clype?"] English Members may not have such a good word. A clype is someone who tells tales.

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The Committee was set up with no judicial form and no rules according to natural justice under which a Member of the House could be indicted. My hon. Friend was not indicted on any particular charge, nor was he entitled to call witnesses : what members of a democratic society would regard as justice did not obtain. The hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mrs. Golding) should not laugh ; these are serious matters, principles of justice on which the House depends.

Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith : It is not true that my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Mr. Browne) could not call witnesses ; he could.

Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : We all respect the Chairman of the Committee, but that Committee has none of the characteristics of natural justice. The Leader of the House knows what they are. What I find so upsetting and disturbing is that the House should suddenly be in a position which, according to the traditions of British justice, should never arise : the jury is being allowed to decide on the sentence. Someone who has been accused of nothing has been found "prospectively" guilty of certain offences, but we have not decided what they are. We know that they are not criminal ; we do not know whether they are ethical or moral, but they are supposed to be unconstitutional.

I find this difficult to understand. Let me say to the Leader of the House, entirely seriously, that although we are apparently supposed to declare our interest, we do not need to do so. How can a Committee without the principles of natural justice find someone guilty of not declaring an interest that the House that has found him guilty says he does not need to declare in any case? I find that an extraordinary concept.

Here we all are. Some members of the jury are out, and some are in. The jury is being asked to say what the sentence should be, but the jury was not even in court. Most of its members who are in court now have not read the report, and do not conceive of the rights or wrongs of what the Committee found.

Whatever the party of the accused, what I find offensive and appalling is that the House of Commons, the High Court of Parliament, should be fussing about saying, "The jury has 100 sentences that we have thought up." The Leader of the House has thought of 20. Others have talked about an honourable discharge and yet others have talked about a forfeit. I find that offensive to all concepts of justice and decency.

The concept of a jury is absurd in this instance--some are here and some are not ; some have gone--some have returned ; some have listened ; some have not, but they will have to vote--on this and that--in one Lobby or another--and pronounce a sentence. Are we going to give out the message tonight that that is the concept of justice of the House of Commons? Are we going to say that that is our attitude to the duty and rectitude of law, equity and judgment? If we are, the House is not performing its duty or doing itself any credit.

Nobody wants to believe more than myself that hon. Members are respected and behave with rectitude and honour. However, if we make this place into an absurd circus of magic justice in which nothing of the principle of

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