UK Parliament / Open data

Business of the House

Business question from Chris Bryant (Labour) in the House of Commons on Thursday, 7 July 2022. It occurred during Business statement on Business of the House.

All the events of today sort of started with the Prime Minister throwing the kitchen sink at trying to preserve Owen Paterson in post, which of course the Leader of the House was also instrumental in. The Standards Committee has produced

a new code of conduct. It is ready to go, and we have published it. Although there has been a form of appeal in the past, we have also published a new procedural protocol that would put in place a formal appeal through the Independent Expert Panel, which is chaired by a High Court judge, Sir Stephen Irwin. We cannot use that, including for new cases, unless the Government table the motions. I had hoped we would do that before the summer recess. I urge the Leader of the House to think again about the past week and whether there is a means of doing this before the summer recess. Otherwise, there is a real danger that we will be in legal jeopardy because we will not know how to deal with an individual case that might come along that might be just as serious as that of Owen Paterson.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
717 c1337 
Session
2022-23
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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