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Mr. Benn: I shall not give way to the hon. Gentleman, because I promised to sit down after three minutes and I shall do that. We should tackle the real question; we should not leave it to Nolan. I am very disappointed that the Privileges Committee unanimously agreed about something that never really tackled the question.
As for the two hon. Members, I am not a bit interested in them because I think that they have done themselves about as much damage as any two Members could have done by their conduct.
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5.28 pmSir Giles Shaw (Pudsey): In following the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), I respect his opinions about those matters. I also recognise the amount of time that it took to get the Privileges Committee on the go, in view of the objections of the right hon. Gentleman to our sitting in private. I think that if we sit in private on that matter--or in public in future--we must ensure that proper provision is made for Members to have the type of assistance that is necessary in a normal court of law.
I do not think that anyone on the Committee of Privileges enjoyed the task that was allotted to us by the House. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House for the way in which he steadied our affairs along.
I wish to add three simple arguments to what has been said. My hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) came first to the House to apologise clearly for what had occurred in relation to what he considered to be falling below the standards of the House. We accepted that then and we accept it now. I am proud to call him my hon. Friend and I look forward to canvassing in his constituency at the next election on his behalf, if he wishes. Having gone that far, it is important that the Committee should be able to set out clearly what it was that occurred and how that apology--if I may put it that way--was rightly earned. But difficulties arose from it.
Throughout the procedures, we have been dealing, not with an ordinary course of accident, deliberate fraud or someone deliberately flouting the rules of the House, but an elaborate entrapment procedure that caught the Members in the net. I fully supported the report, and if I earn the displeasure of the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) for so doing, that will give me a touch of credibility. But the fact that we were unable to find a suitable way of dealing with the activities of The Sunday Times is a matter of great personal regret. I recognise that the Committee was wise in trying to avoid the electric scenes of people coming to the Bar of the House. Such scenes would have created more joy and happiness among the press than a more rational and orthodox way of dealing with the matter. However, that issue has to addressed.
A reference has been made to the Press Complaints Commission. A clear sign has been given that such journalism, with professional and well-trained journalists becoming liars for the week, is not acceptable. We must find a way of dealing with that problem to restore the relationship between Members of Parliament and the press, who seek to get whatever evidence they can from us, on whatever issue, to increase the circulation of their newspapers. It is crucial that we address that matter quickly.
The episode has taught us all a lot. I sincerely hope that the House of Commons will regain its self-respect by not trying to elaborate on the problems that it has faced. It must recognise that there was a most unusual series of events caused by an extraneous force trying to find proof of an allegation. The newspaper was unable to find any evidence in support of the allegations against the four Members and the tabling of questions. After six months of computer analysis not a shred of evidence was found, and the matter should have been stopped there. The newspaper should have known that.
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5.32 pmMr. David Winnick (Walsall, North): I support the recommendation of the Committee of Privileges regarding the two Members. I believe that the recommendation is sound and I shall vote for it in the Division, if there is one.
I do not agree with the strictures on The Sunday Times . It may be a minority view, but it is only right that another view should be advanced regarding The Sunday Times . Conservative Members have spoken in the debate as though the newspaper were in the dock, as though what it did was wrong and there was no public or legitimate interest involved. That view is clearly strongly held by Conservative Members and some of my hon. Friends-- I understand and accept that. But it is not held strongly, if at all, outside the House.
It is interesting that, apart from the Press Complaints Commission, which upheld and justified what had been done, few comments have been made outside the newspaper world along the lines that we have just heard from the hon. Member for Pudsey (Sir G. Shaw) and others--that what was done was wrong. Like other hon. Members, I read the evidence carefully. Leaving aside the issue of what The Sunday Times said in justification--about what it was told by a prominent business man about four Members of Parliament-- if that newspaper came to the view that some hon. Members were tabling questions for money, what should it have done about that?
It could have dropped the investigation and said that there was no way that it could find out the facts. As the editor of The Sunday Times said in evidence, a newspaper reporter could have phoned up the hon. Members, but he went on to ask, what good would that have done? The hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) said in his evidence that, if he had been asked by a reporter whether he would take cash for questions, he would have given the answer that one would expect: no. No Member of Parliament, if phoned by a journalist, would give any other answer.
The Sunday Times therefore decided that there was likely to be some justification in the rumours that were circulating and set about its job accordingly. If, ultimately, The Sunday Times investigation had been carried out and found that no hon. Member was willing to take up its offer, we could all be proud of that. We could justify criticism of The Sunday Times and say that what it did was totally without justification. But surely the reason for today's debate is that The Sunday Times found two Members who--the Committee of Privileges has decided--acted wrongly. The two hon. Members involved have apologised for acting wrongly. However much of a minority view it is, I cannot see why The Sunday Times should be taken to task for carrying out an investigation that it believed to be in the public interest and that was justified by the Press Complaints Commission.
Several hon. Members rose --
Mr. Winnick: I normally give way, but Conservative Members will have to forgive me if I do not give way now. Unfortunately, the debate is confined to just two hours and there is great pressure on time.
It gives me some satisfaction that, of the 20 Members who were contacted, at most three were found to be worthy of
investigation--about one of whom the Privileges Committee came to another conclusion. It
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should give us some satisfaction that the large majority of those contacted would not be involved and made that clear to those who rang them.Mr. David Shaw: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The House has rules about the declaration of interest when Members are speaking. If an hon. Member speaks in defence of a newspaper, should he not declare that in the Register of Members' Interests he declares payment by The Guardian and other fees from the media--as the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) does?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: All right hon. and hon. Members know the rules and it is up to each individual hon. Member to act as he thinks fit.
Mr. Winnick: Having had one article published in The Guardian , I went out of my way to ring up the Clerk of the Committee to ask whether, in view of my position in relation to The Guardian newspaper--which we are not debating today--I should declare my interest. The advice that I received was that it was not necessary to declare my interest in a newspaper as such. I went out of my way to put that entry in the register and I believe that I was justified in doing so. [Interruption.]
Mr. Winnick: I share the concern of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn). I think that the gist of his argument was that, in defending his constituents, he was concerned about standards in the House. We are not concerned simply about ourselves; we are concerned about the maintenance of parliamentary democracy. If there is a general feeling that we are all on the make and there is sleaze everywhere, people lose confidence in this place and in the democratic process. That is against our interests. There has rightly been a great deal of criticism about some of the ways in which newspapers, without justification, have made allegations and published stories about the private lives of hon. Members, whether Conservative or Opposition Members. Only two weeks ago there was a disgraceful story about a Conservative Member that could not possibly involve public interest. Indeed, the newspaper did not try to maintain that there was a public interest element. We condemn trivial rubbish, for which we know there is no justification, and which is published in tabloids for the most obvious of reasons and, unfortunately, taken up by the serious press. But we must make a distinction between sensational tabloid material that has no public interest and legitimate matters in the public interest--which was what The Sunday Times , justifiably, was trying to find out about. The Sunday Times was trying to discover whether hon. Members were willing to take cash for questions. That was a legitimate investigation and in the public interest, so I hold that there is no justification for taking The Sunday Times to task. 5.40 pm
Mr. Julian Brazier (Canterbury): I have tabled the amendment in my name and in that of my hon. Friends because I believe that the punishment of my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) should be reduced to a reprimand. The Privileges Committee's report about my hon. Friend bases its case on a single
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distinction--the distinction between being paid for a question and tabling a question as part of a paid consultancy arrangement. That is implicit when it rightly says that there can be no distinction between being paid for tabling a question and a consultancy arrangement that only involves tabling a question.I know that I am not alone in my view. The right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) and other hon. Members on both sides of the House wonder whether there can be such a clear distinction. However, the Committee had no choice but to make that distinction, because it has been accepted according to long-established precedent that hon. Members on both sides of the House have interests about which questions have been tabled from time to time. I have not done that myself, but I am raising no objection now to that practice. If we accept that premise--I think that there are good reasons for wondering whether it is a sound one--we must then ask what are the facts of the case involving my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley. Did he or did he not think that he was tabling a question as part of a consultancy arrangement? The original meeting at which the arrangement was made took place on the Terrace of the House. Quite conveniently, it is the only conversation of which The Sunday Times has failed to produce a tape recording.
We know that The Sunday Times journalist concerned, Mr. Calvert, alleged initially that the meeting took only five minutes. Upon cross-examination by the Committee, he subsequently admitted that it could have taken half an hour. In such circumstances, I wonder how much weight should have been given to his testimony in my hon. Friend's case.
I shall shorten my case, as my time is limited. It has been alleged that my hon. Friend smelt a rat when he sent back the cheque. In fact, he carried out research first, not, as some hon. Members appear to believe, after he had received the cheque or after he had tabled the question. The hon. Gentleman did exactly what I would have done if, as a former business man, I were assisting a consultancy--although I would not have tabled a question. He went to Companies House to gather information about the company concerned. When I worked on takeover bids before my election to the House, I would begin my investigations at that point.
My hon. Friend agreed to table a question--that is the only point at which I disagree with his actions. I would not have tabled a question if I had a consultancy arrangement with a company--as many other hon. Members who have consultancy arrangements with businesses or trade unions have agreed to do in the past. [Interruption.] I know that hon. Members on both sides of the House want to see justice done and we are currently considering an issue of individual justice. A cheque subsequently arrived through the post and appended to it was the note, "Your payment for tabling a question." Although there had been an initial half-hour discussion about a consultancy arrangement, it was at that point that my hon. Friend realised that it was not a consultancy arrangement: it involved simply tabling a question. Within an hour or two, he put the cheque back in the post--long before anything was exposed.
My hon. Friend has admitted to an error of judgment, and I think that he made such an error. However, I believe that he is a man of the highest integrity and I am proud
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that he is one of my colleagues. It is unbelievable that the Privileges Committee should propose to suspend him for 10 days over this matter.I feel bound to put one final comment on the record. I have been a Member of Parliament for less than eight years and, as such, I do not expect my views to carry much weight. However, I was astonished that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who is the Chairman of the Committee, did not give us any guidance about the substance of the case against my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley. I could not help contrasting his actions with the short speech that my noble Friend Lord Howe delivered in the much more grievous case involving the former Member for Winchester. In a few succinct sentences, Lord Howe gave the House clear guidance as to the substance of that case. I believe that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House had difficulty giving guidance about the substance of the case against my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley, because there is no substance to that case. I urge all hon. Members to support my amendment.
5.44 pm
Mr. Kevin Barron (Rother Valley): I tabled the amendment which appears on the Order Paper because I do not believe that the Privileges Committee's recommendations are strong enough. However, I will back the Committee's recommendations if my proposals do not receive the support of the House. I will certainly support the Committee's recommendations against the other amendments which have been tabled today which suggest that at least one, if not both, of the hon. Gentlemen involved should be let off.
On 13 July last year when we debated the issue, the hon. Member for Tayside, North (Mr. Walker) said that tampering, for whatever motive, with the right to ask questions should be dealt with severely by Parliament. I agree entirely with his comments. However, it is not simply a question of journalists or members of the public tampering with parliamentary procedure. As Members of Parliament, we should ensure that we do not tamper with or undermine the credibility of the tabling of parliamentary questions. I believe that the hon. Members for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) and for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick) have tampered with our right to ask questions in the Chamber, and I agree that they should be dealt with severely.
When we table questions in the House, at public expense, people in the community should be confident that we do so as part of our duty as Members of Parliament and not in order to receive a fee. I am particularly concerned about the nature of the apology that the hon. Member for Colne Valley made to the House on 13 July last year. If hon. Members look closely at the letter submitted to the Privileges Committee by the hon. Gentleman on 3 March, they will see that he seems virtually to renounce his initial apology to the House. The letter states:
"I wish to emphasise my strong belief that I was not in breach of Parliamentary privilege."
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The hon. Gentleman puts up a robust defence of his actions and says:"A possible breach of privilege could only have occurred if I knowingly agreed to table a question in return for money. This I totally refute."
On 13 July last year, the hon. Gentleman said:
"I accept that I made an error of judgment in agreeing to table a question and in agreeing initially to accept a fee".--[ Official Report , 13 July 1994; Vol. 246, c. 1026.]
There is no reason why the two hon. Gentlemen should be treated differently as result of what happened on the Terrace of the House or in the parliamentary precincts.
Outside the House, the hon. Member for Colne Valley is telling another story. He recently gave an interview to the Huddersfield Daily Examiner and the article stated that he was
"relieved that the Committee did not say he was in breach of privilege, nor that he was in contempt of Parliament".
I do not believe that that is true. We are discussing the issue today because the Privileges Committee believes that the hon. Gentleman was in breach of the privileges that we enjoy as Members of Parliament. I believe that the electorate, and not necessarily the Parliament, should decide the future of the two hon. Gentlemen. The Nolan committee may reflect on whether we should sit in our own judgment in the future.
No talk about set-ups or secret taping by journalists, and no cries of underhanded tactics or entrapment, can justify the hon. Gentlemen's decisions to accept payment for tabling parliamentary questions. I do not defend the actions of the journalists concerned; I think that they were wrong. However, I defend the actions of those Members of Parliament on either side of the House who were also approached by journalists. Six Labour Members and four Conservative Members refused to table questions for a fee.
The hon. Members for Colne Valley and for Bosworth also had that option, but they did not say no. I am sure that the majority of hon. Members would refuse to table questions for a fee and, on that basis, I believe that the two hon. Gentlemen deserve the punishment which will be meted out to them today.
5.48 pm
Mr. Nigel Waterson (Eastbourne): I shall comment briefly on the amendment standing in my name on the Order Paper. Almost every hon. Member who has spoken in the debate today has accepted that it is wrong to receive money in return for tabling questions. That principle was also accepted in the generous apologies of my hon. Friends the Members for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) and for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick) with regard to this matter.
Beyond that, it is absolutely right that the House should debate our future conduct and that rules, Members' interests and so on should currently be a matter for the Nolan committee.
The motion is not even-handed. Recently, there have been several instances of the decline in the standards of modern journalism in The Sunday Times , The Guardian and others. They work on the principle that the ends will justify practically any means. One has only to look at the report. It found that
"the Sunday Times ' conduct of its enquiries fell substantially below the standards to be expected of legitimate investigative journalism."
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It also stated:"the taking of clandestine recordings is manifestly a contempt of the House."
Another phrase leaps off the page:
"This was clearly a form of entrapment through deception." One Opposition Member used the word "seduction".
Sir Michael Marshall (Arundel): I have considerable sympathy with my hon. Friend's views. He will be aware of my concern, as I feel some responsibility for referring journalists to my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick). Will he take into account two considerations? The first is the repeated use of the suggestion that a constituent had put the journalist in touch with the Members of Parliament concerned, and the second, which perhaps is not clear in the report, was the journalist's claim to be a friend of many Members of Parliament, including myself, which clearly influenced strongly the reaction of my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth.
Mr. Waterson: My hon. Friend's points are absolutely valid. It was not only a deception, but a deception planned in the most infinite detail by the journalist involved and based on a tissue of lies. We are asked to believe a theory that is based on evidence of people who have not been named--the men who never were. The report is redolent with observations and conclusions on the conduct of The Sunday Times .
In principle, I support the Committee's conclusions on the penalties on my hon. Friends, but only if an equivalent penalty is imposed on the newspaper involved. I see no reason why such sanctions should apply to my two hon. Friends, but not also to the newspaper, and that is why my amendment calls for journalists working for The Sunday Times to have their Lobby passes withdrawn for a period of 20 days.
It may assist the House to know that I do not intend formally to move the amendment standing in my name, but on that basis I cannot support the main motion on the Order Paper.
5.52 pm
Mr. Joseph Ashton (Bassetlaw): The references to The Sunday Times have been wide and varied, but there have been few references to the powers of the Press Complaints Commission, which are non-existent. In the past three years we have considered the Calcutt report and the report of the National Heritage Select Committee on privacy and media intrusion, which dealt with the antics of the press. We have also seen what the Chancellor of the Exchequer was spending on his credit card flashed across the papers, Princess Di having intrusive cameras in the gymnasium and the royal family's telephones being bugged. The growth of electronic surveillance is totally out of control.
Even since the publication of the report, there was the incident reported in the News of the World two weeks ago. A woman had a tape recorder in her handbag when she met a Conservative Member of Parliament. Every word was recorded and splashed across the newspapers. There are no ground rules and no controls. There have been recommendations from the Calcutt committee and the Select Committee, but nothing has been done. I am critical
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of the Government, but the Press Complaints Commission knows that there must be some self-regulation and some ground rules. That is how every other organisation works.Sir Wyn Roberts (Conwy): Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Ashton: I am sorry, but there is not enough time.
The press breaks its own embargoes on the Queen's Speech. There is no question of the Press Complaints Commission fining or suspending anyone. There are picket lines on doorsteps as soon as anyone is in the news and an army of freelances invades people's houses. The tactics of the press and the growth of electronic surveillance cannot be allowed to continue without some control. The British press now resembles the KGB, the Stasi and J. Edgar Hoover, and all the villains use the excuse of investigative journalism.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: What could The Sunday Times have done?
Mr. Ashton: It could have gone to the police. It is amazing how often the police tipped off The Sunday Times when they were about to raid the house of Bruce Grobelaar when he was accused of taking a bribe. They work and collude together, but the victim has no recourse unless he has £500,000 to spend in the libel courts, which few people have.
In the two or three years since Calcutt and the Select Committee report, the Press Complaints Commission has refused to introduce ground rules in the same way as the British Medical Association and the Law Society have done, or self-regulation stating that it is not in favour of entrapment or of agents provocateurs.
A recent article in The Sun stated:
"Colin Stagg, cleared of murdering Rachel Nickell on Wimbledon Common, is suing the police for malicious prosecution and wrongful arrest . . . after an Old Bailey judge condemned police over a trap set by an undercover girl detective to lure him into a confession." The girl had carried a tape recorder and when the police produced the tape in court, the judge kicked out the evidence.
We now have one rule for the police and another for the press. The Select Committee report on the press stated that there should be no protection for Members of Parliament or any other famous people. It suggested that we go into the arena, so we know what to expect, but even in an arena we expect some Marquess of Queensberry rules.
Mr. Denis MacShane (Rotherham): Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Ashton: I am sorry, but I do not have enough time. There are no rules even in the House. Anyone connected with the press who comes into the House should wear a badge. At the Labour and Tory party conferences, members of the press have to wear a badge. How many times do we go into a bar in the House and talk to a strange face? We do not know who those people are and they do not introduce themselves. They have been banned from the Terrace because of the way in which they hounded hon. Members who were in the news, so they now resort to the subterfuge of going on to the Terrace with a microphone up their sleeve.
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Why cannot the Committee of Privileges and the Press Complaints Commission get together and say that we shall accept the present method of lobbying, provided that there are Lobby rules in the House so that we know what is happening?When members of the press ring me, I automatically assume that they have a tape recorder running at the other end of the telephone. I have taken three cases to the Press Complaints Commission--I won twice and lost once--and the telephone conversation was produced every time. Everyone should be aware that the growth of electronic technology is such that it has produced not the freedom of the press, but the unlicensed tyranny of the press, which newspapers abuse regularly to denigrate democracy in the House and increase circulation. 5.58 pm
Mr. David Evans (Welwyn Hatfield): It is important for debates in a national Parliament to reflect the central cultures of the nation that it aims to represent, so today's debate must be reflecting the time-honoured British custom of hypocrisy.
The Sunday Times , once a great national paper, is reduced to gutter reporting. Everybody in the nation and everybody in the House knows perfectly well what those journalists were doing. They used totally different approaches to Conservative and Labour Members. One minute they were talking about offers of a public affairs contract, the next they were having a conversation on the Terrace about consultancy and then, when the Committee asked for a very important tape--the House will not believe this- -they lost the tape. They think that we all come out the Thames in a biscuit tin.
It seems, however, that there is a gulf of difference in the way in which Members register how they sell their services. What is the definition of long or short-term consultancy work? What is the definition of consultancy work? Surely those are two of the central questions that we should be asking.
We should consider also establishing a suitable means of adjudicating on alleged cases of corruption and misuse of privilege. If a Member's memory falls foul of the hazy House of Commons guidelines, he must undergo a trial by a kangaroo court. My hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) returned the cheque on the same day that he received it. He believed that the transaction could be classed as a short-term consultancy. After checking the details of the transaction more thoroughly, he felt, as he put it--this was on reflection--that it would be inappropriate for him to accept the cheque. He made a mistake and he did everything in his power to remedy it as quickly as possible. He apologised to the House at the earliest possible opportunity.
In my opinion, my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley acted as honourably as he could after he had discovered that he had made an error of judgment. Somehow that is not good enough. The Committee of Privileges still wishes to punish him. The Committee classed my hon. Friend's concept of short-term consultancy as a breach of privilege even though there are no clear guidelines.
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It is not only Members who sell their services. We know that entire political parties sell their souls and their policies for financial reward. For a start, take that lot over there on the Opposition Benches. Why is it that 175 Opposition Members, including the entire Opposition Front Bench, are sponsored by unions? Why is that? It is done so that Labour Members can table questions on behalf of unions day in, day out, to look after their unions' interests.Why does the Labour party raise £8.5 million a year? Half of it comes from its unions so that it can look after their interests. That is why Labour Members table questions day in, day out in this place. Why is the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair), the Leader of the Opposition, who is better known as Bambi or the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Oratory), so eager to explain to the British public that
"trade unions will have no special or privileged place within the Labour Party"?
How is it that such wanton hypocrisy is allowed to go unpunished? Labour does not confine itself to exercising hypocrisy in accepting favours from the unions. The Labour leadership campaign provides an example. Three former London Weekend Television executives paid and fund-raised most of the £79,000 required for Bambi to become the leader of the Labour party. Those executives all made millions out of share option schemes. The hon. Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown) has been trying to make sanctimonious scandal out of share option schemes. Does not that seem a little like double standards? Why was not the £79,000--
Madam Speaker: Order. We have had an amusing couple of minutes, but I must bring the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Mr. Evans) to the motion that we are debating, which is set out on the Order Paper. Perhaps he will return to the motion and the amendments that are before us.
Mr. Evans: The double standards in this place are there for all to see. Have any of us never made a mistake? We have all made mistakes. When we pass through the Lobbies, we shall see the ones who claim that they have never made a mistake. We shall see which Lobby they pass through.
I do not condone the actions of the Members in this matter, but rather than make scapegoats of them so as to brush a problem under the carpet, surely it is best that we think seriously about remedying the nonsense in the rules governing privilege. In that way, we shall all know where we stand. When a Member clearly breaks the rules against that background, I shall be the first to say that he or she must be punished.
6.4 pm
Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours (Workington): I am sure that the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Mr. Evans) feels most relieved to have got all that off his chest.
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First, if it had not been for The Sunday Times , the truth would not have come out. Let there be no doubt about that. Secondly, can we be clear what we are talking about? We are talking about conduct by Members--Mr. Campbell-Savours: Perhaps more than 100 other Members. Over the years, Members have been prepared to sell the service of using parliamentary procedures to their clients for personal benefit. That has been going on for decades in the House, and that is what the hon. Members for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) and for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick) stand accused of. Let their punishment be seen in that light.
I have major and deeply-seated concerns about the report of the Privileges Committee. I feel ambiguous about the conclusions that the Committee has arrived at. Paragraph 47 causes me particular concern. It reads:
"We see"--
that is, the Committee--
"no sustainable distinction between a payment of £1000 for tabling a Parliamentary Question and a consultancy for which the fee is £1000 and the only requirement the tabling of a Parliamentary Question." The Committee sees "no sustainable distinction" between the two propositions. Nor do I.
I would go further. I see no distinction between a consultancy for which the fee is £1,000 for tabling one question over a period of a few days, and a consultancy for which the fee is the same £1,000 for tabling a series of questions over a few weeks. There is no distinction to be drawn. In my view, they are both consultancies. I understand that the hon. Member for Colne Valley protested to the Committee--this was later in his evidence--and said that he did not believe that it was a consultancy when he realised that he had to table only one question. I do not accept that. The relationship was parliamentary consultancy from beginning to end and indistinguishable from other relationships between Members and their clients in which series of questions are being asked.
The Committee, however, has seen a distinction. Paragraph 48 states that, in the first case, the action
"fell short of the standards the House is entitled to expect of its Members, and that the House should take appropriate action to mark this view."
That is in the case of one question for £1,000. When it comes to the issue of a number of questions for £1,000, the Committee fails to take a position and says, in effect, that it may well return to the matter later.
The Committee had a duty to consider consultancy in its widest context before it drew the conclusions that it did in the case of the hon. Members for Colne Valley and
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