Reports
to the Committee in 2006-07
3.10 The first report concerned the failure of a
Member to register a fund he had set up to assist him in pursuing
a civil action. The Committee agreed with my conclusion that the
fund itself should have been registered under Category 10 of the
Register (the Miscellaneous Category), and individual donations
to it which exceeded the threshold for registration under Category
5 (Gifts).[17] The Member
subsequently made the relevant entries, which were recorded in
the Register in the distinctive form also used for the rectification
procedure.
3.11 The second case concerned a complaint about
correspondence received by a member of the public concerning a
conference to be held in the House by a commercial organisation.
The conference was, in the event, cancelled. It was clear that
the Member who had sponsored it did not have any financial interest
in the company in question and had believed that he was acting
in accordance with advice he had sought from the relevant Department
of the House before proceeding with the event.
3.12 The Committee nonetheless shared my view that,
had the conference proceeded, it would have represented an inappropriate
use of House facilities, given its clear business focus.[18]
The use of House stationery to send out invitations to the conference
was also inappropriate. Recognising that the Member involved was
newly elected and that he had acted promptly to cancel the conference
(at some cost to the company concerned), the Committee did not
feel it right to take the matter further. It nonetheless took
the opportunity to remind Members that they must be scrupulous
in observing the rules laid down to protect the name and the reputation
of the House from commercial exploitation.
3.13 Two further reports concerned the use of House
stationery, and in one instance, pre-paid envelopes, by a Member.
In the first case, the Member, having received a copy of my memorandum
to the Committee, decided to repay the cost of the headed paper
and envelopes he had used to send out a circular communication
to some of his constituents and instead charged the cost to his
Incidental Expenses Provision (IEP), as he was entitled to do.
This action obviated the need for the Committee to determine this
aspect of the complaint against him. The Committee, however, agreed
with me that the case provided pressing evidence of the need to
revise and clarify the House's Stationery and Postage Rules, and
offered to work with the House of Commons Commission and the Administration
Committee to help develop "a single unified stationery
and postage regime governed by one clear set of rules".[19]
3.14 There was a second aspect to the complaint in
this case, which concerned the content of an annual report which
the Member involved had circulated to his constituents and had
funded from his IEP. Although I felt that in one respect this
fell outside what was acceptable, the Committee took the view
that it fell within the range of Members' current practice. The
Committee nonetheless said that it would look further at the general
matter of publications funded from the IEP. Its intention was
in the event overtaken by the development of fresh rules relating
to the new Communications Allowance, to which I have referred
earlier in this report.[20]
3.15 In the second of the two stationery cases, the
Member concerned had paid herself for the House stationery she
had used, but had used it to write to a large number of her constituents,
among other things urging the merits of a candidate of the same
political party as herself who was standing in an impending local
council by-election. The Committee agreed that this was a clear
breach of the rules relating to the use of the House's Crowned
Portcullis emblem.[21]
3.16 The fifth of the ten reports made to the Committee
in 2006-07 concerned a complaint that a Member had, without permission,
altered an electronic copy of an Electoral Commission news release
by inserting a quotation from herself before forwarding it to
the news media in a form which suggested that it remained an official
Commission release. The Committee agreed with my finding that
although the Member's actions had not breached the Code - as there
was no intention on her part to deceive or manipulate the public,
nor had that been the effect of her actions - they had been unwise
and unfortunate.[22]
3.17 This case is of particular interest because
it was only the second one in which the Committee had had to consider
the application of the 'disrepute' provision in paragraph 15 of
the Code. I took the opportunity to suggest a number of tests
to apply in deciding whether this provision had been breached.[23]
3.18 The sixth report I made to the Committee in
the year under review concerned the alleged failure of a Government
Minister to register hospitality and gifts he had received in
the course of a visit abroad. My jurisdiction lay in relation
to the Minister's obligations as a Member under the Code and Rules
of the House, not to his obligations under the Ministerial Code,
although it was also relevant that paragraph 5.28 of the then
Ministerial Code provided:
"In the event of a Minister accepting hospitality
on a scale or from a source which might reasonably be thought
likely to influence Ministerial action, it should be declared
in the Register of Members' or Peers' Interests."
3.19 In the event, the Minister decided, following
advice from the Secretary to the Cabinet, to register his stay
in the Register of Members' Interests. I found that he was right
to have done so. There was no need for him to register the gifts
he had received because they had been retained by his Department.
The Committee agreed with my analysis.[24]
It commended to Ministers the guidance I had offered in my memorandum
to the Committee on the considerations relevant to any decision
facing them as to whether to record in the Register hospitality
they had received. The Committee also noted the difficulty caused
by the absence of arrangements for independent investigation of
alleged breaches of the Ministerial Code. It concluded:
"We recommend that the Prime Minister considers
introducing an independent element into the investigation of complaints
of breaches of the Ministerial Code."[25]
3.20 A further complaint required me to apply the
tests I had set out in an earlier case relating to the 'disrepute'
provision in paragraph 15 of the Code (see paragraph 3.17 above).
A local government official complained that a Member had used
foul and abusive language in a telephone conversation with him
and had subsequently attempted to intimidate the official into
not pursing a complaint against the Member. Whilst I did not,
on balance, find the latter allegation proven, I did uphold the
former as a breach of paragraph 15. The Committee agreed and required
the Member concerned to apologise to the official unconditionally
and without further delay.[26]
This the Member did.
3.21 In the last of the series of reports it published
before the 2006 summer recess, the Committee considered a memorandum
from me on a complaint alleging that a Member had improperly used
House stationery and pre-paid envelopes to consult local residents
on a proposed controlled parking scheme, and in doing so had improperly
sought to boost the prospects of candidates of his own party in
imminent local elections in the neighbourhood.[27]
The Committee agreed that whilst it had been proper for the Member
to canvass local opinion on the parking scheme, the terms of his
letter had been inappropriate. It therefore ordered the Member
to repay the cost of the stationery and pre-paid envelopes he
had used.
3.22 The last two of the ten reports published in
the year under review both involved the alleged use of House facilities
for party fundraising. In the first, it was an advertised benefit
of membership of a particular club (whose clear purpose was to
raise money for a political party) that its members would have
the opportunity to meet the Member concerned over lunch in his
office at the House. The Committee found that the Member had been
ill-advised to link directly the issues of access to his office
and party fundraising.[28]
In view of the Member's speedy and full apology and his undertaking
that there would be no repetition, it concluded that further action
was unnecessary.
3.23 The final report was among the most extensive
of those I have produced, in that it involved complaints by two
Members that events of varying types held by a total of 25 Members
in the private dining rooms of the House constituted their use
for the purposes of fundraising for a political party and thus
breached the House's Banqueting Regulations. Having examined the
individual circumstances of each of the cases, I did not, on the
facts, uphold the complaints against 14 of the Members involved.
In the remaining 11 cases, I found that there was a case to answer
but recommended that, since the practice revealed was widespread
and of long standing and the complaints exposed widely differing
interpretations of the Regulations among Members, it would be
unwise and unjust to find the Members concerned in breach of the
Code. Nonetheless I suggested that some aspects of the practices
revealed were undesirable and that clearer guidance to Members
was needed which would avoid any possibility in future of the
House's dining facilities being used for party fundraising purposes.
I also offered guidance to help Members avoid any suggestion that
visits to the House were being used for a similar purpose.
3.24 The Committee agreed both that it would not
be right in the circumstances to single out any individual Members
concerned for action by the House and that practice in respect
of use of the House's dining facilities by organisations raising
funds for political parties was in need of reform.[29]
Rather than issuing new guidance, it preferred to proceed by way
of an amendment of the Regulations to make clear that the use
of the facilities for both direct and indirect fundraising was
prohibited, and it so recommended to the Administration Committee
and Mr Speaker. This recommendation is currently under consideration.
In the meantime the approach taken by the Committee sets the framework
for consideration of any future complaints relating to these matters,
and my office has advised Members accordingly.
3.25 The investigation and consideration of these
complaints proved particularly complex, not only because of the
number of Members involved and the differing circumstances of
each case but because the complaints were not all submitted at
once but over an extended period. The two complainants themselves
noted the 'generic' nature of their complaint and suggested that
the Committee on Standards and Privileges should consider how
such generic complaints were best raised and dealt with in the
future.[30]
Trends
over the last five years
3.26 The table below reproduces the annual analysis
of complaints against Members for each of the five years 2002-03
to 2006-07.
Complaints in 2002-07
