Parliamentary Standards Bill

I would like to draw the House's attention to clause 1(2), which states that schedule 1 provides for the new body's""administration functions to be carried out by its chief executive in accordance with paragraph 17 of that Schedule"." The Secretary of State will know where I am going with this—at least I think he will—because paragraph 17 of schedule 1 refers not just to administrative functions, but to regulation functions. I invite hon. Members to glance at page 13 of the Bill in order to follow what I am about to say. Paragraph 17 distinguishes those two functions from one another, so that, "So far as possible"—whatever that means—""the…administration functions and…regulation functions must be carried out separately"." That must happen""so that one set of functions"—" by the way, the word "functions" means powers and duties—""does not adversely affect the carrying out of the other."" Paragraph 18 of schedule 2 gives the meanings of "administration functions" and "regulation functions", but I have to say—I say this as gently as possible—that it is utterly disingenuous. I know the Justice Secretary well enough to be surprised that he has allowed the drafting of the Bill not to refer to the regulatory functions in clause 1(2), but they are hugely important, for the reasons that I am about to give. Paragraph 18 of schedule 1 says that the new body's administration functions are""its functions under…section 2 (payment of MPs' salaries)…section 3(1) (payment of MPs' allowances)"" and""section 4 (dealing with allowances claims)"." That raises a raft of issues, which I do not need to go into now. The paragraph continues:""and the function of maintaining and publishing the register under section 5."" Paragraph 18(2) says that the regulation functions of the body are""its functions under…section 3(3)…(preparing and revising MPs' allowances scheme)…section 5 (preparing and revising MPs' financial interests rules),"" and, in paragraph 18(2)(c), "determining procedures for investigations". I suspect that my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green)—or, indeed, any other hon. Member—might be interested in that provision, in relation to the question of the entry by the police into this House, on which I have spoken on many occasions. I have also got into some severe altercations about that with the Attorney-General, who alleges that it is for the courts to decide such matters, not the House of Commons. You will forgive me, Mrs. Heal, if I make it abundantly clear that I still totally and utterly repudiate the reasoning in her memorandum. I believe that that was the first occasion on which a memorandum from the Attorney-General was placed in the Library, at my insistence—and, to give her credit, the Leader of the House agreed to ensure that it was put there. The issues are profound, because they relate to article IX of the Bill of Rights, in respect of which I have tabled a new clause, which I am glad to see that you have selected for debate tomorrow, Mrs. Heal. I therefore do not need to go into that in detail now, but I do need to go into the supremacy of Parliament, which relates to new clause 7. New clauses 7 and 8 deal with the supremacy of Parliament and article IX of the Bill of Rights, which relates to the internal regulation of the proceedings of this House by this House. That is where the Bill gets into deep trouble. I shall not go into that now, although not because it is out of order—it is not—but because I prefer to reserve my arguments for the new clauses tomorrow, on which I shall have a certain amount to say.