Parliamentary Standards Bill

I echo some of the points just made by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. We, too, are concerned about the commencement provisions. No doubt the noble Baroness can answer that one in due course. We are also anxious about the question of examples. It does not seem entirely logical. There may be cases at the moment that fall within this category and cannot be referred to, but apparently she cannot speculate about future offences. Perhaps she can give us some guidance on that in due course. We are in a rather unusual situation. Amendment 76C, which we tabled and which is supported by the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, is swept up by government Amendment 76B, as is Amendment 77ZB because the Minister has endorsed our amendment on that. So we are left with the clause stand part discussion, to which I expect much more eminent Members of your Lordships’ House are going to contribute in a moment. I have no real expertise, but I make this point as a non-lawyer: the crux of the issue is whether there are some circumstances in which the prosecuting authorities will not be able to act in a way that would be comparable to the circumstances of a member of the public rather than of a Member of Parliament. Are we on all fours? Is there a soft-option argument? That issue has been addressed on a number of occasions in previous debates, both today and previously. Is the Bill, in the term of the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, "sentence-light" for Members of Parliament in a way that the public would find difficult? The issue of the definition and completion of a case with regard to dishonesty is both difficult and controversial. Under both the Theft Act and the Fraud Act, where members of the public would be convicted there is presumably case law, and presumably that can apply here. But are the prosecuting authorities still able to act in the case of an offence by an MP on exactly the same terms as a member of the public? That, to a non-lawyer, is the crux. The noble Lord, Lord Peston, referred in an intervention earlier to a discussion that took place in your Lordships’ Constitution Committee. I have searched briefly through the various reports from that committee; they are timely and excellent reports but, as far as I can see, that discussion is not reflected in them. When such distinguished Members of your Lordships’ House make a contribution of that sort in your Lordships’ own committee to that effect, it raises important questions that we will need to have answered. I hope that the Minister will be able to do so. To a non-lawyer, we now have a Clause 8 that is shorn of its most obvious difficulties but still raises important questions of principle about the equal treatment of Members of Parliament compared with their constituents. I hope that the noble Baroness will be able to reassure us that the Bill as it stands, with those omissions, which we assume will go through, does not leave us open to the soft-option argument.