Parliamentary Democracy and Standards in Public Life

Lord Stunell Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stunell (LD)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to take part in this debate and to follow the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, and his excellent words about ACOBA. I was a member of the Committee on Standards in Public Life when it published its reports Standards Matter 2 and Upholding Standards in Public Life, and I strongly commend all their recommendations to noble Lords for implementation.

Of the latter report’s 34 recommendations, the Government at the time accepted 14, partially met 10 and rejected 10. When you look at the detail, you can see that the Government accepted all the recommendations that would restrict other persons or bodies from crossing ethical red lines, rejected all those that would limit their own scope to transgress ethical boundaries and kicked into the long grass any idea of embedding any of the existing ethical guidance mechanisms into primary legislation. It is easy to be cynical about the motivation of that, but I want to be constructive and look forward to how we can genuinely improve the current ethical framework, which is far too dependent on the integrity of those it is intended to restrain who, in the past, have all too often finished by being judge and jury in their own cases.

The committee’s other report, Standards Matter 2, reinforced the urgency of safeguarding all ethics regulators from interference in both their initial appointment and their scope and power when operating. That report was triggered by the fiasco of the treatment of the Independent Adviser on Ministers’ Interests by the Government of the day, and it set out the overwhelming case for embedding our ethical guidance framework in legislation and for the appointment process of ethical regulators themselves to be properly insulated from malign political veto.

The very disappointing government response to those reports came several Prime Ministers ago. Today, we have had multiple public resets of government, and I hope that the Leader of the House, in replying, will take the opportunity to give a more rounded response than was given then and to give noble Lords a strong signal that this Government accept that further reform is now urgently necessary.

When the political wheel turns and today’s Government become tomorrow’s Opposition, I predict that they will, in any case, be rapidly converted to the importance of having a statutorily embedded ethical system in our public life—when they are no longer in charge of running it. In short, it is in the interests of all parties for each Front Bench to declare today that they now heartily endorse the CSPL’s package of reforms and will set out a plan to deliver them. I look forward to hearing it in the winding-up speeches.