Parliamentary Standards Bill

Of course I accept the noble Baroness’s assurance that she will look carefully at the first two of my four amendments—the others disappear with the disappearance of Clause 7, which I suspect that the Committee will accept later. I ask her to look at them carefully. I want to get to a position where the activities of the new bodies that we are setting up—IPSA and the commissioner—will not be justiciable, because they will be regarded as within the control of the House of Commons. I understand the noble Baroness’s point. She wants to demonstrate to the public at large and to the media that these are independent bodies. As my noble friend Lord Higgins said, that needs to be clarified because at the moment it is not clear at all. If there is one issue that stands out above all others—indeed, it was the subject of the extremely helpful letter from the Clerk of the Parliaments—it is what is to be regarded as justiciable in the courts and what is not. At the moment, I am not clear on that, which is why I tabled the amendments.