Parliamentary Standards Bill

This is the appropriate place to talk about the clause, as amended, that we are now considering. Earlier in the debate it was not amended, although this Motion was grouped with the amendments. It is now a different Clause 8 from the clause with which we started the debate. I want to raise two points. First, if you have a generalised offence and you have a particular offence that falls within that general offence, there is at least an argument that when this is done by Parliament it creates the second offence for the purpose of carving out that particular area from the major offence. Otherwise, what is the point if the one covers the other? Therefore, there is at least a risk that if this provision is carried into the law there will be an argument to say that the general offences do not apply to Members of Parliament. I do not say that it would necessarily be successful, but I think that there is a very good chance that it would. Obviously, the discussion we have here would be open under the law as it now stands to be looked at by the court in deciding that question. My second point is this. I want noble Lords to assume that a Member of the House of Commons makes a claim under the MPs’ allowances scheme. That is, he or she is claiming money. He provides information—he is not going under a particular head or anything—that is supposed to be factual, which he knows to be false or misleading in a material respect. Can you imagine—I ask rhetorically—that being honest? I find it extremely difficult; in fact I find it impossible to envisage that a person can make a claim for money under the allowances scheme providing what he or she alleges to be fact knowing that what he or she alleges to be fact is either false or misleading—and it is for the purposes of the claim. In other words, to advance the claim he provides information that he knows to be false or misleading. It is not an absolute offence in the sense that if it is false or misleading he is liable: he has to know it is false or misleading. If he does that, can anybody suggest that it could be regarded as honest? The standards of honesty in this country must have fallen very far if that is to be allowed as honest. I am as certain as I can be that this offence is covered under the general law of the Theft Act or the Fraud Act. Therefore, I think there is a very severe risk, at the least, that this would be regarded as carved out and therefore providing a very much lower maximum sentence for Members of Parliament than in the generalised law. If the Government think that is a good idea, I find it difficult to accept that. I can understand well the point the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, makes about making sure that people making claims understand the seriousness of it. I suppose one way of doing that is by ensuring that the claim form that you have to fill up states the risk of criminal prosecution in the event of making false or misleading statements in the claim form. I think that it is going a little bit far to put in a new offence for that purpose to signal to MPs that this is a dangerous business from the point of view of prosecution, particularly when it carries the risk that it would exclude Members of Parliament from the generalised scheme. So I find it very difficult. I know the position that the Leader of the House has taken up, and, as I said earlier, I very much respect all she has done to help us as a House to carry out our work of reconsidering the Bill in a very short time. I think they have done that extremely well, but I really cannot see justification for this particular provision. Therefore, for my part, I would like to see Clause 8 not stand part of the Bill.