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3.10 pm
Mr. Eric Forth (Bromley and Chislehurst): I suppose that I should start by making a kind of declaration of interest. I was a member of the Standards and Privileges Committee in the previous Parliament, and I am currently a member of the House of Commons Commission. I therefore have a direct interest in and relevance to today's proceedings. I hope that if my comments are brief—unusually brief by my standards, some might say—that will in no way indicate a lack of interest on my part or a lack of importance attached to the issues. On this occasion, happily, I am in a position to endorse not only what the Leader of the House said but what my right hon. Friend the Chairman of the Committee said. It is obvious from their comments that a lot of thought has been put into this matter on behalf of the House by the Government and in particular by the Committee, and I am more than happy, on behalf of Her Majesty's official Opposition, to endorse what has already been said.
I want to quote from the second report of the Standards and Privileges Committee, which sums up the dilemma that faced Members of the House following the Wicks committee report. Paragraph 5 on page 6 states:
- "The Wicks Committee rightly recognises that the system for regulating standards of conduct must be consistent with constitutional principles, including the need to ensure that Parliament remains free to regulate its own affairs without executive or judicial interference. This collection of related rights and immunities is essential if Parliament is to be able effectively to discharge its responsibilities as the nation's legislature on behalf of the people; the Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege asserted as 'axiomatic' the inclusion of the responsibility of each House for disciplining its own members."
Having said that, I would like to welcome very much the Government's response to some of the quite tricky recommendations that emerged both from Wicks and from my right hon. Friend's Committee. I pay tribute to the Leader of the House and to the Government for accepting some of those recommendations, not least those regarding the composition of the Committee, which in its own way is groundbreaking, and the Leader of the House's undertaking about the chairmanship of the Committee. It is appropriate in that regard to pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for demonstrating that having a Committee of the House chaired by a distinguished member of the Opposition is not only something that can be made to work but made to work very satisfactorily, and can add to the perception of the effectiveness, impartiality and independence of the Committee. In addition, in relation to the no doubt painful recommendations about the role of Parliamentary Private Secretaries in the Committee, I can attest to the fact that, as my right hon. Friend said, the way in which the Standards and Privileges Committee has worked—certainly in the previous Parliament, and I have no reason to doubt that the same has been the case in this—has been consensual. There has been no evidence that I ever saw of partiality by members of the Committee. Nevertheless, on this occasion, we are right to take the view that perception, in this area perhaps above all others, is of vital importance, and that we take such steps as are seen to be necessary to reassure members of the public that this Committee, with the vital role that it plays in our business, is above and beyond any reproach, which I believe that it is and will continue to be.
All in all, while the Wicks committee did invaluable work, and it has rightly caused us to re-examine our position and our procedures in this matter, we have taken a responsible and robust view of what it said. What has been recommended and what the Government have said in response will bear examination and will ultimately enhance the reputation of the House. There is some evidence that that is already happening and, without rehearsing all the details again, what my right hon. Friend said is significant in that the number of complaints—let us remember that they are mainly from the public—has been dramatically reduced over the past year or two, which I hope indicates that matters in this important area are improving and will continue to improve, supported by the mechanisms that these resolutions today will put in place. I warmly recommend them to the House. I support them and I hope that the House will do so too.
3.17 pm
Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall): I wish not only to reiterate in precise terms what the shadow Leader of the House said about our accountability to the electorate,
which it is important to rehearse, but to say how disappointed I am that the House is not full to hear him not only congratulate the Government but thank them. When the House was fuller, earlier in the day, I am sure that he would have found a different reaction. It is an almost unique occasion—I am sure that we should all relish this moment—and we will make sure that it is given prominence in future.In common with several other Members present today, I gave evidence to the Wicks committee. I certainly do not want to rehearse all the issues that the committee considered, but I would like to say, as the Chairman of the Standards and Privileges Committee has said, what a thorough job it did on our behalf. There is value in someone from outside the parliamentary building and the ethos of this place looking at our procedures and testing them against other criteria. I also endorse the points that the Chairman of the Committee made at the end of his speech with which I agree entirely.
This area raises important issues, which the Wicks committee and the subsequent discussions in the Committee and the Commission have underlined. Is the system for self-regulation of the House by the House sufficiently robust? Does it provide sufficient reassurance to the electorate to enhance and restore confidence in parliamentary integrity? Is it sufficiently even-handed to provide natural justice for those alleged to have infringed the code of conduct while also ensuring that justice is done and seen to be done?
I pay tribute to both the Committee and the Commissioner. There has been a steady and substantial improvement on all those counts in recent months, both in performance and perception. That is largely due to the fact that we had a fresh approach by new people, including, of course, the new Chairman and the new Commissioner. If this debate had taken place 18 months ago, it would have been extremely controversial. I guess that not only would the Galleries have been full but the House would have been full. The improvements that have taken place over that period are, if I may put it this way, a tribute to the new regime. It can also be said that there is much to commend in the guide and code improvements of 2002.
That does not mean that there might not be dangers in the future. Several witnesses drew it to the attention of the Wicks committee that the tit-for-tat period in the run-up to the general election was a real problem. Often spurious accusations against Members were made by Members of other parties, which were carefully timed to seek publicity for the complaint, in the knowledge that they would take time to feed through the system and, therefore, the result—probably, if not always, clearance and dismissal—would come after polling day. That affected hon. Members of all parties and did no credit to the House of Commons.
David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden): Recommendation 7 of the Wicks report says:
- "The Guide to the Rules should be amended to set out clearly the means by which the Committee on Standards and Privileges would deal with frivolous or vexatious complaints."
Mr. Tyler: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I am glad to find support for the view in the House and I suspect that it might be shared among all parties.
I want to give a specific example, and I hope that the Chairman of the Committee and the Commissioner will take it seriously. I am aware of a Member against whom a set of accusations was made, some of which were endorsed by a Member of another party who had designs on nomination to the constituency that the first Member represents. It took more than six months to clear the complaints, so an enormous amount of work was hanging over that Member during the whole process and he was distracted from his duties in the House. Such a situation could be damaging to a Member's work in certain circumstances. I understand that the Commissioner has cleared the Member of all the complaints, with his usual excellent care and consideration, but the process took six months.
I entirely endorse the point made by the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) that, in such circumstances, it should be open to the Commissioner to recommend to the Committee that action be taken. That action should be known to the House, and perhaps publicised more widely so that we would discourage such complaints because Members of all parties may suffer. The situation is especially likely in the run-up to a general election, so now is the time to take action. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his support and I hope that he was speaking on behalf of his party because that might be substantially helpful as we discuss the matter.
My colleagues and I entirely agree with the suggestion in the first motion that the Committee should be able to recommend a salary penalty. We accept the Leader of the House's argument that other concerns such as the requirement for an Opposition Member to chair the Committee could be dealt with more appropriately in the way suggested rather than being a Standing Order requirement, as at the moment. We, like other hon. Members, note the Government's commitment that that would be their "firm intention"—I think that that was the Leader of the House's expression.
With regard to the third motion, I understand the Leader of the House's point that at this stage it is difficult to know whether it is necessary to make changes to the Commissioner's role by statute. I agree with him because, for goodness' sake, we should avoid bringing such measures through the House with the full legislative panoply. I am sure that he appreciates that time is precious.
I think that all the other matters in the third motion reflect the Commission's views. Unlike other participants in the debate, I have no official status because I am a member of neither the Commission nor the Committee. Thank goodness for that, because it is the last thing that I would want—I am glad that the matter is in the capable hands of the right hon. Member
for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth). The Commission has agreed to recommendations 20, 21, 22 and 24 of the Wicks committee.While addressing the second motion, I wish to follow the sequence of the excellent explanatory memorandum. I note that the Leader of the House quoted from it extenso—if that is the right word—and rightly so, because the House's explanatory memoranda are so good that they are generally much better than the motions, let alone the Bills.
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