Heath, Beith and Reid quiz Harman on Parliamentary standards

10.22.15am BST (GMT +0100) Sat 27th Jun 2009

• [Jun 23] David Heath (Somerton & Frome, Liberal Democrat): ' . . AS far as I am concerned, data protection is important but having acres of black space is a redaction to the absurd.'

I thank the Leader of the House for her statement, and for my early sight of it. The public will welcome the fact that a shared view is emerging that fundamental reform is urgent and vital. However, I also suspect that people may be getting a little tired of party leaders trying to claim unique credit for that, whether on the lunchtime news or in this Chamber. I also wish that there was a shared view among hon. Members about the commitment to transparency and openness. I am not yet convinced that that is the case, and it may be something that we still need to work on.

That brings me naturally to the publication of expenses. As far as I am concerned, data protection is important but having acres of black space is a redaction to the absurd. In my published expenses, the address of my local newspaper was removed, apparently because I had put in a receipt for an advertisement that I had placed. That suggests that we need to look at the matter again, and urgently.

The Leader of the House knows that I have also given evidence to the Kelly committee. As she said, what is required is what is needed to do the job as a Member of Parliament-no more, no less. My view is that the right way forward is that basic accommodation costs only should be claimed, but we must wait and see what Kelly says. I ask her to confirm yet again that the Government will accept the recommendations of the Kelly inquiry, whatever they may be. Will she also confirm that she will accept the recommendations of the Committee to be chaired by the hon. Member for Cannock Chase and put those recommendations, whatever they are, before the House, rather than editing them in advance?

On the Parliamentary Standards Bill, the Leader of the House knows that we support the principle of external regulation. Has she given any further thought to registers held by the House, other than the Register of Members' Interests, that should be covered by the Bill? Will she look again at the common law offence of misconduct in public office? The maximum penalties for the offence are life imprisonment and unlimited fines, which many of our constituents may feel is insufficient for many Members. Will the right hon. and learned Lady look at putting that on a statutory basis, as recommended by the Committee on Standards in Public Life in 1997?

Lastly, I welcome the transparency that is being proposed on non-parliamentary income, but I feel there are still problems with the de minimis requirements and their connection with the advocacy rules. I do not want us to be in the position that no Member of the House can visit a factory in their constituency and accept a cup of tea and then say something in the House about the industry or their constituency. I do not think that the code of conduct and the guidance notes yet make the distinction that provides for those circumstances.

The Leader of the House has our general support for the measures she has put forward today. We must now make progress, and the sooner we can do so, the better.

Harriet Harman (Lord Privy Seal, House of Commons; Camberwell & Peckham, Labour): As I said, the House authorities will be looking again at the question of redactions. That exercise, which they undertook for the first time, involved 800,000 pages, so inevitably some things that Members are concerned about will fall either side of the line. Before the 2008-09 receipts are published, Members will be able to look again at all those issues and discuss them with the Information Commissioner, and any Member who wants to can submit suggestions about the issues in principle.

The hon. Gentleman asked whether there will be acceptance of the report of the Committee on Standards in Public Life under the chairmanship of Sir Christopher Kelly. The hope is that we do not once again have to trawl through all the issues we went through last July and this January. There is the expectation that we will be able to accept the report and we certainly hope that will be the case.

I agree that we expect the proposals of the Committee chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase to come before the House through a resolution. That is the whole point. There is no point a Committee sitting, having a lot of good thoughts and making good proposals if nothing happens as a result. There is a commitment on the Labour Benches to seeing such proposals go forward.

The hon. Gentleman asked whether the offence of misconduct in public office should be put on a statutory footing. That is being considered by my right hon. Friend the Justice Secretary, but it would not be a matter for the Parliamentary Standards Bill, which we have tried to keep narrow and focused.

The hon. Gentleman talked about the difficulty of transparency in the registration of pay. As he is a great champion of transparency on allowances, I ask him to apply that mindset to the question of transparency on pay. If somebody has a cup of tea when visiting a factory, nobody would regard it as payment for services. I think Members can distinguish payment for services from a donation. Different rules will apply to donations from those that apply to payment for services. We all need to make the rules work. This is long overdue: if people take money from their constituents for doing things, the public should know about it.

. . Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed, Liberal Democrat)

The Leader of the House spoke of the new committee that will consider proposals for dealing with non-Government business. Will she assure me that she does not seek to prevent that committee from considering the idea of a business committee, through which the House could decide how it allocated its time in dealing with the Government's business, particularly bearing in mind that, in the election to be Speaker yesterday, almost all the candidates who got almost all the votes committed themselves to such a proposition?

Harriet Harman: I shall table a motion later today setting out the terms of reference that we propose for the committee. Hon. Members will be able to consider the motion, which will be amendable, and there will be a debate on Thursday.

. . Alan Reid (Argyll & Bute, Liberal Democrat): I welcome much of what was in the statement today, but there was one important omission, which my right hon. Friend Sir Alan Beith mentioned. I hope that the committee chaired by the hon. Member for Cannock Chase will be able to consider the programming of Government Bills on Report. Scrutinising Bills is one of the most important jobs that we do, and it is very important that amendments on Report should be grouped in such a way that all parts of a Bill are discussed. I hope that the committee will be able to look at that aspect of programming.

Harriet Harman: We will table today the motion to establish the remit of the committee, which we hope the House will pass. There will be an opportunity for the hon. Gentleman to examine it and, if necessary, propose amendments.

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