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Mr. Robathan: My hon. Friend has used a good example, but I am not clear how the Bill would improve the situation. My hon. Friend is talking of a clear case of maladministration, of the system not working, of officials, elected officials and people in the education department, being in cahoots and refusing to take action. The case had to be resolved in court action--or an industrial tribunal. I am not sure how the Bill would make the situation any better for the person involved.
Mr. Duncan Smith: That is the point. My hon. Friend said that the case had to be resolved through court
action--why? I am talking of an individual who raises an issue internally. What would any good organisation want to do about that responsible individual? It would want to answer the charge; it would have a structure to deal with the issue. I have just highlighted a case in which the organisation refused to deal with the issue because that would have created bigger problems.
My point does not involve resolving the matter in court--the lady should not have to go to court. She has already spent £21,000 trying to defend her name, and will now, I suspect, have to spend even more money--under clause 3 of the Bill, that could not happen. The lady is being penalised simply as a result of raising the issue--that is an important point.
If the clause was enacted, the organisation would not have been able to take the action it did, because the lady would have been able to claim that it was contravening the new legislation. I am not talking about massive Government expenditure or a new set of regulators, but simply a clause that allows the person involved to say, "Stop: I am an individual with rights and you are abusing them." I do not see how any hon. Member could reject that responsible and reasonable measure in any circumstances.
Mr. Denis MacShane (Rotherham):
The hon. Gentleman has moved from companies to the public sector very quickly. Is not the core of the Bill the fact that the public sector is where whistleblowing is most necessary? Is that why the Government are to oppose the Bill tooth and nail a little later this morning?
Mr. Duncan Smith:
I always enjoy interventions from the hon. Gentleman. I have moved into the public sector with this case; I do not know what my hon. Friends on the Front Bench will do--that is clearly for them to decide. I hope that they will allow the Bill to progress into Committee, because I believe that, as long the core argument is retained, much of the Bill can, if necessary, be changed. The Bill is designed to stop great abuses in the public sector and to resolve problems where individuals who could improve organisations have their claims rejected because various people have particular reasons for doing so.
Mr. Robathan:
My hon. Friend is extremely generous--this is an important point. We would all support the woman involved in the case that he has mentioned. It is an incontrovertible fact that she has been hard done by--I suspect, illegally--and I am sure that an industrial tribunal will give her due compensation. I think that we all condemn those who, according to my hon. Friend, have behaved unjustly. Clause 3 may give legal backing to the woman. However, were the Bill enacted, she would still have to go to court to obtain recompense, just as she does now. It seems that another regulation is to be piled on top of laws that already exist.
Mr. Duncan Smith:
With all respect to my hon. Friend, the Bill is not about piling another regulation on top of existing laws. My hon. Friend says that the woman would have to go to court anyway; I am saying that, at present, there is a process of expenditure whereby, in order to prove his or her case, the person involved has to go to court, which means that lawyers obtain money and nobody else succeeds in obtaining anything.
Clause 3 would mean that the person involved did not have to go to court, as the organisation would not have been able to dismiss her. The issue at stake in the Bill is that it will not be possible to proceed against an individual who blows the whistle. The Bill is not about regulation; it does not impose greater regulations on any company. The Bill simply ensures that it is in an organisation's interests to deal with the matter internally--a point illustrated by the case that I mentioned.
My second case involves one of my constituents,Mr. Bill Sutherland, who used to be a policeman. In July 1988, he had cause to complain about his then chief superintendent, Archie Newlands, who is now deceased. Due to a variety of issues that boiled up at the time,Mr. Sutherland was concerned about his chief superintendent's close association with a wealthy local business man, Mr. Morris, and their close links with the local authority. It is a complex case, and I shall not go into the details.
Having raised the issue, far from being applauded for having taken what he thought was a matter of concern to the appropriate authority, he found that everyone turned on him, and he was gradually forced to back away from his original job. He was transferred away, shunned, and treated as a pariah. He was given menial tasks, such as checking subscriptions to the orphans fund. It was almost as though people felt that he was a specimen with whom they did not want to deal too often, because he had raised a concern about a senior officer, and that simply was not done.
At the end of the day, the case was examined and the individuals concerned were exonerated, but we never found out what happened during the investigation, why they were exonerated and why none of the concerns seemed to have been dealt with.
After a series of problems, the individual who had raised the matter was invalided out of the police force, and in many respects his life is in tatters. He asked only for a proper review of the evidence that he had placed before the investigation, and an open examination in which he could have some faith without necessarily having to suffer. To this day, he continues to attempt to get the police to investigate his original charges reasonably and properly, and believes that the evidence that they turned up in the course of their inquiry showed that he was quite right, but that the real problem was not investigated, and he was punished for raising it.
I support the Bill, although I recognise that it will need some work in Committee.
Mr. Peter Viggers (Gosport):
Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Duncan-Smith:
No. I have given way several times, and I wish to conclude, as other Members wish to speak.
Mr. Mark Fisher (Stoke-on-Trent, Central):
I am grateful for the opportunity to support the Bill. It is an excellent measure, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig) on picking up a Bill of such importance so early in his parliamentary career and presenting it with enormous clarity and conviction. I hope that Ministers were as impressed as the rest of the House by the responsible and measured way in which my hon. Friend introduced it.
As my hon. Friend acknowledged, the House is also in the debt of my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock and Burntwood (Dr. Wright), who set the framework for the Bill, and, as we are on the subject of congratulations, of one or two people outside the House. The measure would not be possible but for the work of Mr. Maurice Frankel and the Campaign for Freedom of Information, who has campaigned tirelessly for the past 10 or 15 years, and, more recently, the work of Lord Borrie and Public Concern at Work.
There is a tide of opinion in the House and outside that we have to open up society, not only for reasons of principle but for good pragmatic reasons. It is inefficient, and often worse, to continue to be a secretive society, as too many institutions and companies are, in the public and private sectors. Secrecy and non-disclosure are in the bones of our society, and it is about time we got rid of them once and for all.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn acknowledged, the reasons are not simple, and not all of them can be addressed by legislation. He was very clear about the tradition of non-disclosure that runs through our culture. Institutionally, there is a tradition of deference in organisations, where the employer, the boss or the person who is better qualified or more in control of information is assumed to know best and inquiries or fears are often set aside because people are told, "It is more complicated than you understand--don't worry, we shall sort it out".
There is a patronising, paternal element in too many of our public and private institutions, which suppresses the tendency for people to be worried and to speak up. That institutional culture is difficult to address.
As my hon. Friend also acknowledged, there is a long-running personal culture in Britain. People often have too much loyalty to the team; they want to be liked, and do not want to be difficult. People are inhibited if they know that they may put the jobs, reputations or salaries of colleagues at risk by speaking out.
Those cultural and personal reasons tend to reinforce the desire not to speak up. Legislation cannot address those factors, but it can--as the Bill does very well--provide a framework, so that, when people are driven to raise an issue as matter of last resort because they recognise its seriousness and its implications, they can at least feel that they have some protection in law.
The seriousness and the scale of those problems has been illustrated by my hon. Friend, and I suspect that other hon. Members will do so throughout the debate. Financial fraud, such as that in Barings bank andMr. Leeson's 88888 account, and the laundering of
money, particularly in drug trafficking, are enormous problems that are difficult to bring to light. Unless people feel that they have some protection, we shall never find out what happens. Members on both sides of House are concerned about the laundering of money in drug trafficking. There is no way in which it can be addressed without such protection.
No doubt my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Mr. Jamieson) will speak movingly about the Lyme Regis problem, and my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) will deal with the problems in the health service. As the hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Duncan Smith) is interested in European matters, we should also consider the European perspective.
Hon. Members on both sides recognise that the scale of fraud in the European Union is enormous. It has been estimated at 1 billion ecu, which is more than 1 per cent. of the total European Union budget. It occurs particularly in agricultural subsidies, where it is extremely difficult to bring to light and wastes huge sums of money throughout the European Community.
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