Parliamentary Standards Bill

Absolutely; that is why I partially take the blame. I have been here for four years, and along with many Members who have been here for longer, I have had the opportunity to deal with the matter on several occasions. I am glad that we are beginning to deal with it, but I am not sure that the Bill is exactly the way in which to do so. On the subject of earnings, there is some pressure because of the downturn, and the matter of outside interests has now been raised, too. There is a history of failure to address the problem. It is interesting, by way of context, to look at the number of committees that already exist, and the number of mechanisms that we already have, to deal with expenses. There is everything from a Members Estimate Committee, advisory bodies to it, a Members Estimate Audit Committee, a Committee on Members' Allowances, an advisory body on Members' allowances, the Senior Salaries Review Body, the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, the short-term Kelly review by the Committee on Standards in Public Life, plus several others. There is lots of machinery already there to deal with some of the issues. One of my concerns about the Bill is that we should be careful about introducing yet another body if its relationship to the committees in the system is not clearly defined and carefully debated. What are the pressures on us? First, clearly, there is the media. In some ways they performed a great function by uncovering many of the complications and discrepancies in the system. To a certain degree, they are to be congratulated on that. However, the media's aim is to sell newspapers, so a good headline is no headline at all. What they are looking for are negative headlines. The current system delivers such headlines and bad news day in, day out. Secondly, any parliamentary candidate fighting an incumbent MP will wish to highlight every small detail they can, in order to demonstrate that they may be a better representative. The current expenses system leaves all Members open to such criticism. I shall return to that. Thirdly, political parties are a source of pressure. There is political capital to be made from highlighting how one side or the other has been misusing a system that is incredibly complicated. To someone who, like me, came from the world of business, it is interesting that all the pressures from outside and many from within this place seem to undermine the integrity of MPs, and the information that comes through is used to undermine what we do here. I am conscious that the media will pick out one or two select sentences from the debate today to demonstrate how MPs are trying to hold back the process of reform, and so on. The pressures are enormous, but there is no countervailing pressure from this place to correct that imbalance. There is no clear definition of the role of an MP. The role has grown and evolved. Bagehot identified a few responsibilities, including choosing a Prime Minister, expressing the opinions of the people whom an MP represents, and teaching the nation""what it does not know"." One or two others have commented on the role, but we know, as the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) made clear, that the role is much bigger than that. We have responsibilities to Parliament, to committees, to constituents, to our parties, to ourselves and our own integrity, and to our family—if we neglect our family, we will come in for criticism. We have responsibilities to support charities locally, to respond to letters, to create laws, to participate in debates, to attend votes, and to respond to the media. Members who are Ministers or who have a Front-Bench job have another job on top of that. That is a quick smattering of the kind of responsibilities we have. In any debate on the Bill, or on expenses, salaries and remuneration, we must first consider what is expected of a Member of Parliament before setting out the remuneration and allowances. The role has changed over the years.