It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Amess. The hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Thomas Docherty) has given you some timekeeping assistance through his suggestions, and I shall try not to fall foul of that.
As the group includes many amendments and new clauses, I shall say something about the overall choice facing the Committee that is embodied by the measures, before giving the Government’s assessment of each, which I hope will help the Committee. If there is time, the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr Gyimah), will make a speech at the end of the debate, so colleagues who speak after me will have an opportunity to hear a reaction to their remarks.
As I explained on Second Reading, the Bill has had a difficult history. Some people are against it—and indeed against anything that introduces a system for recalling MPs. The Political and Constitutional Reform Committee concluded of the draft Bill:
“We do not believe that there is a gap in the House’s disciplinary procedures which needs to be filled by the introduction of recall.”
My hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) made a similar point. Others, including my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith), believe that we should adopt an entirely different model of recall: one that is not
triggered by proven misconduct, but can instead be initiated by a petition of the electorate for any reason at any time.
That disagreement could lead one to suppose that the Government’s Bill is just another contribution to a debate without consensus, and that it has no greater or lesser significance than any other approach, but that would not be right. The Bill is fundamentally different from the approach of no recall, or that of recall for any reason at any time, although I hesitate to tease my hon. Friend by referring to that as the Martini recall—any time, any place, anywhere. The Bill as drafted implements completely and faithfully the promises that the main parties made in their manifestos at the general election. The Conservative manifesto promised that
“a Conservative government will introduce a power of ‘recall’ to allow electors to kick out MPs, a power that will be triggered by proven serious wrongdoing.”
The Labour manifesto said:
“MPs who are found responsible for financial misconduct will be subject to a right of recall if Parliament itself has failed to act against them.”
The Lib Dem manifesto said:
“We would introduce a recall system so that constituents could force a by-election for any MP found responsible for serious wrongdoing.”
The coalition agreement reflected those positions.
As drafted, the Bill would cause a recall petition to be triggered if an MP was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of up to a year or a suspended sentence of any length—hon. Members will know that disqualification is already automatic following immediate imprisonment of more than a year—or, in other words, if serious wrongdoing was proved; or if an MP was suspended by the House for at least 21 sitting days, or 28 continuous days, which again would indicate proven serious wrongdoing. Members will of course consider carefully all the amendments that have been tabled, but it is only reasonable to observe that both other views, whatever their merits, do not implement the particular commitments that all parties made to the electorate at the previous election.