Register of Interests of Members' Staff

Register of Interests of Members’ Staff

1. Resolutions of the House established a Register of Interests of Members’ Staff on 17 December 1985 and 28 June 1993 in accordance with arrangements approved by this Committee’s predecessors. This Report proposes that the House adopt a new resolution to amend and expand the scope of that Register in line with current working practices.

2. At present, Members’ staff who hold a pass to the Parliamentary Estate are obliged to register certain interests, but this requirement does not extend to staff who have access to parliamentary digital facilities, including an email account. Changes in technology, working practices and the number of staff employed by Members all contribute to there being greater numbers who have full access to parliamentary information and materials without a need to be present on the estate, and therefore a need for a pass. At the beginning of this year, around 2,000 passes had been issued to Members’ staff while 4,202 had parliamentary network accounts. In other words, more than half the staff employed by Members were not required to make a transparency return.

3. An appendix to this Report, provided by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards with the support of the Registrar for Members’ Financial Interests, sets out the background to the creation of the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff and the rationale for this proposed change. In short, the principled argument for inclusion of all staff who work for a Member regardless of their ability physically to access Parliament or its services depends on their privileged access to parliamentary facilities.

4. The Registrar and the Parliamentary Digital Service are developing an IT solution within the existing registration portal to provide an authoritative list of Members’ staff without creating any burdensome administrative task for Members. The Committee on Standards will, in line with usual practice, review, and potentially revise, the Code of Conduct within the next two years. That review will provide an opportunity for wider consideration of the process and timings for registering Members’ staff and the responsibilities of Members’ staff in relation to the Register, as well as the process relating to complaints about the same.

6. This change would require to be agreed by resolution of the House of Commons. This might be best achieved by an amendment to the Resolution of 28 June 1993. Such an amendment might also usefully enable this Committee to make any necessary transitional arrangements for the introduction of the change, particularly as regards its timing.

7. We invite the Leader of the House to table such a motion in the terms set out below:

That, this House approves the Third Report of the Committee on Standards, Session 2024–25, HC 943, on Register of Interests of Members’ Staff, subject to any transitional arrangements agreed by the Committee on Standards, and amends the provisions endorsed by the Resolution of the House of 28 June 1993 as follows:

Members’ staff who hold a permanent photo-identity pass or have been granted a Parliamentary network account are required to register in the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff, subject to the thresholds set out in that Register:

• ‘Any occupation or employment for which they receive over £450 from the same source in the course of a calendar year, if that occupation or employment is in any way advantaged by the privileged access to Parliament afforded by either a photo-identity pass or a Parliamentary Network Account;
• Any gift (eg jewellery) or benefit (eg hospitality, services) they receive, if the gift or benefit in any way relates to or arises from their work in Parliament and its value exceeds £450 in the course of a calendar year; and/or
• Any visit undertaken that has been paid for by a third party, if it in any way relates to or arises from their work in Parliament.

Appendix: Note by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards

Introduction and Summary

1. Under Standing Order No. 150 (2)(a) I am responsible for maintaining the Register of Interests of Members’ Staff established by Resolutions of the House on 17 December 1985 and 28 June 1993 in accordance with arrangements approved by the Committee.

2. The purpose of this note is to invite the Committee to recommend the House to pass a resolution expanding the scope of the Members’ Staff Register of Interests.

3. (The Committee will recall that I wrote on 1 November 2024 advising that I was intending to change the title of the Register from its previous archaic form to the more simple Register of Interests of Members’ Staff. That change was implemented in 2025 through the Parliamentary Digital Service as part of the digitalisation project for the Register.)

Summary

4. At present, Members’ staff who hold a pass to the Parliamentary Estate are obliged to register certain interests in respect of which that pass might be thought to be an advantage.

5. Nowadays, having access to parliamentary digital facilities (including an email address) confers as much potential preferential access as a pass to the Estate.

6. I therefore recommend that the scope of the Members’ Staff Register should be expanded to include both staff who have a photo identity pass to the Estate and staff who have a parliamentary network account that gives them a parliamentary e-mail address and access to digital facilities.¹

Background

7. The Select Committee on Members’ Interests proposed a Members’ staff Register in its First Report of Session 1984–85 (HC 408).

8. That Report gave the following rationale for a Members’ Staff Register:

15. We have also considered the position of others, such as Members’ secretaries and research assistants, who have privileged access to the precincts. With the increase in the numbers of such persons in recent years, and with a number of them concurrently pursuing other vocations this has become a more material matter and we have received evidence that some research assistants, for example, use their access to Parliament to further those other occupations. O ne example cited to us it the benefit of prompt, and sometimes free, access to Parliamentary papers. It was urged that only in the building could Parliamentary papers be promptly identified and obtained, and the Institute of Public Relations asked for an accessible sale point for Parliamentary papers outside the building. Neither access to the building nor the availability of Parliamentary papers are matters for us. We have drawn the attention of the House of Commons (Services) Committee to the evidence which we have received.

16. Apart from research assistants abroad whose main purpose is to advance their education, we have identified part time research assistants whose principal task is to serve an all party group. No doubt other secretaries and research assistants have other occupations in the field of lobbying and public relations. Again, the holder of a Member’s Secretary pass is a full-time paid officer of a charity, whose principal task is to serve an all party group. No doubt other secretaries and research assistants have other occupations which may be advantaged by their access to the precincts. We think it proper that the House should be aware of these other activities of those to whom it affords access. Representatives of the Secretaries and Research Assistants Council expressed themselves not averse to being required to register any other occupational interests which they might have. We recommend that holders of photo identity passes as Members’ secretaries or Members’ research assistants be required to register any gainful occupation which they may pursue other than that for which the pass is issued, and that a copy of the Register should be placed in the Library for the use of Members.

9. The House approved the Committee’s Report and resolved that:

“2. Holders of permanent passes as Members’ secretaries or Members’ research assistants be required to register any relevant gainful occupation which they may pursue other than that for which the pass was issued …”

10. The Resolution of 28 June 1993 extended the requirement to include the registration of gifts, benefits and hospitality.

11. The scope and requirements for the Members’ Staff Register have not been amended since 1993.

12. The current requirements are that holders of photo identity passes as Members’ secretaries or research assistants register:

“Any occupation or employment for which you receive over £450 from the same source in the course of a calendar year, if that occupation or employment is in any way advantaged by the privileged access to Parliament afforded by your pass.

Any gift (eg jewellery) or benefit (eg hospitality, services) that you receive, if the gift or benefit in any way relates to or arises from your work in Parliament and its value exceeds £450 in the course of a calendar year.”

13. The Committee’s Report made clear that privileged access covered not only access to the Parliamentary Estate but also facilities that Parliament offered (for example access to parliamentary papers).

The position today

14. The original requirement that Members’ staff with a photo-identity pass be included on the Register reflected the working arrangements of that time.

15. Modern forms of communications and online services that are now provided by Parliament were not available when the Resolution was passed.

16. Nowadays, a parliamentary network account affords staff privileged access to parliamentary facilities regardless of whether they are passholders.

17. A network account gives staff the ability to communicate with individuals and organisations both inside and outside of Parliament using an authoritative parliamentary email account.

18. Parliamentary network accounts also enable access to services provided through House of Commons intranet, ParliNet, including room booking services, MemberHub services and now the Registration Portal.

19. For those reasons, if the criteria for appearing on the Register are to reflect the working practices of the parliamentary community, privileged access to parliamentary IT facilities should be part of it.

20. At the beginning of 2025, approximately 2,000 passes had been issued to Members’ staff. 4,202 Members’ staff had parliamentary network accounts. Therefore, around 2,000 staff have privileged access to parliamentary facilities but are not required to make a transparency return.

21. The Registrar considered the merits of extending the requirement for registration to all staff that work for a Member of Parliament regardless of their ability to access Parliament or its services. The principled argument for inclusion depends on privileged access to parliamentary facilities, not on holding a position in support of a Member per se. As such, the Registrar concluded (and I agree) that it would not be proportionate to require staff without a photo identity pass or a parliamentary network account, some constituency staff, for example, to be included.

Source of information

22. There is presently no authoritative list of Members’ staff including both passholders and parliamentary network account holders which could be relied upon to compile the Members’ Staff Register.

23. At present, the Members’ Staff Register is compiled using information provided by the Pass Office. This is limited to information about which staff hold a pass, which new passes are issued and which passes have expired. The list does not include information about staff who have a parliamentary network account but have not been issued with a photo identity pass.

24. The Parliamentary Digital Service (PDS) do hold some information about which staff members have active parliamentary network accounts, but they have expressed concerns to the Registrar about the accuracy or comprehensiveness of that data.

25. If Members informed the Registry Office when a staff Member joined or left, the Register would become the authoritative source of information about Members’ staff. As well as enhancing the accuracy and sufficiency of the Staff Register, this would provide an authoritative list of Members’ staff (who have been issued with a photo identity pass and/or parliamentary network account) that would benefit other parts of the House service. We outline how this can be done in paragraph 27 below.

26. The Registrar has discussed this with managers in PDS who are supportive of this change. They explained that network accounts remain active when PDS haven’t been made aware the member of staff has left. If Members informed the Registry Office of staff changes it would help in the further enhancement of the Register of Interests system, ensuring the data PDS held was accurate and reliable.

27. Clearly, it is important that this should not become a burdensome administrative task for Members. Accordingly, the Registrar has agreed with PDS that they will develop an IT solution within the existing Registration Portal to enable Members to add and remove staff in a similar way to delegating access to their staff. This could include an option for a Member to delegate the function of adding or removing staff to their office manager. It would also deliver benefits to other IT products, including the option for Members to delegate permissions in systems such as MemberHub.

28. Passes issued for a single day would not be included in the new arrangements, nor are there compelling security or access reasons for their inclusion.

29. As PDS are presently working on the digitisation of the Members’ Staff Register (following the successful digitisation of the Register of Members’ Financial Interests last year) this is a timely opportunity to consider the requirements for that work.

30. Members are required to register their interests within 28 days. At present, there is no timeframe within which Members’ staff are required to register their interests.

Recommendation

31. For the reasons given, the Registrar and I recommend that the requirement for appearing on the Members’ Staff Register be amended to include Members’ staff who have been granted a photo identity pass or a parliamentary network account.

32. Should the Committee agree to this proposal, the Committee could invite the Leader of the House to table a Motion to give effect to it, in the form of a Motion for a Resolution to amend the Resolution of 28 June 1993.

33. The forthcoming review of the Code of Conduct will provide an opportunity for wider consideration of the process and timings for registering Members’ staff,² and the responsibilities of Members’ staff in relation to the Members’ Staff Register, as well as the process relating to complaints about the same.

Conclusion

34. I will be happy to expound or discuss any aspect of this note that would be helpful.

Daniel Greenberg CB

12 March 2025

Formal minutes

Tuesday 10 June 2025

Members present:

Alberto Costa, in the Chair

Paula Barker

Gill Furniss

Sir Francis Habgood

Dr Michael Maguire

Mehmuda Mian

Dr Rose Marie Parr

Anna Sabine

Victoria Smith

Gareth Snell

Dr David Stirling

Carys Williams

Michael Wheeler

Register of Interests of Members’ Staff

Draft report (Register of Interests of Members’ Staff) proposed by the Chair, brought up and read.

Ordered, That the draft Report be read a second time, paragraph by paragraph.

Paragraphs 1 to 7 read and agreed to.

One paper was appended to the Report.

Resolved, That the Report be the Third Report of the Committee to the House.

None of the lay members present wished to submit an opinion on the Report (Standing Order No. 149(8)).

Ordered, That the Chair make the Report to the House.

Adjournment

The Committee adjourned.

List of Reports from the Committee during the current Parliament

All publications from the Committee are available on the publications page of the Committee’s website.

Session 2024–25

Number	Title	Reference
1st	Bob Stewart	HC 455
2nd	Andrew Bridgen	HC 832
1st Special	The House of Commons standards landscape: how MPs’ standards and conduct are regulated: Government Response	HC 637

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Footnotes

1 Photo identity passes and parliamentary network access are provided to Members’ staff following successful application by the relevant Member.

2 Members are required to register their interests within 28 days. At present, there is no timeframe within which Members’ staff are required to register their interests.