I rise to speak to amendment 41, standing in my name, which would add the words:
“No action shall be initiated against an MP in relation to a recall petition process on the basis, or as a result of votes cast, speeches made or any text submitted for tabling by such an MP, within, or as a part of, a parliamentary proceeding.”
It is quite obvious what I am trying to get at, and I am afraid I disagree with my hon. Friends the Members for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) and for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith). I believe that parliamentary privilege and our freedom to say anything in this House, knowing that we will be held to account only in a general election, is a very powerful defence of liberty against tyranny. It is a matter of the utmost importance, and I think that the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park is extraordinarily dangerous.
I know that the very phrase “parliamentary privilege” sounds a bit old fashioned and pompous, but it is terribly important in our history. As the Library put it,
“The ancient origins of parliamentary privilege, and the archaic language that is sometimes used in describing it, should not disguise its continuing relevance and value. As we have noted…the work of Parliament is central to our democracy, and its proceedings must be immune from interference by the executive, the courts or anyone else who may wish to impede or influence those proceedings in pursuit of their own ends.”
For centuries, we have maintained from the Bill of Rights the absolute freedom of extraordinarily difficult, unpopular, unfashionable people to say difficult, unfashionable, unpopular things in this House, knowing that nobody outside in any court—this is where I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr Heath), who wants to set up some electoral process or court, or whatever it is called—can hold them to account. Every Member has known for centuries that they have the freedom to express very unpopular opinions, knowing that they can be held to account only at a subsequent general election.
8.45 pm
Indeed, why do we slam the door in the face of Black Rod at the opening of Parliament? History is important. There was a time when the King marched up that aisle and tried to arrest some of us. It was not because we were guilty of some corrupt act; it was because we were saying things that the Executive did not like. Ever since then, and culminating in the events of the 1680s—when, I am sorry to say, there was a king on the throne who was trying to set up an absolute monarchy—we have maintained this privilege through the Bill of Rights. It is not some old-fashioned, archaic term that is irrational and that should be swept away on a tide of populism. If we were to go down the Richmond Park route, we would not be making this place more democratic and accountable. Actually, we would be silencing the freedom of this place to express unpopular opinion.