Professional Standards in the Banking Industry

Damian Collins Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Ed Balls]

I will take the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s intervention, but I will make the point on powers first. I will do this in a proper way, Mr Deputy Speaker.

All the recent experience is that only a judge-led inquiry can have the necessary power to compel witnesses to attend and to ensure the production of documents, with powers of enforcement that make it a criminal offence to fail to comply—under section 35 of the relevant legislation, the penalty is 51 weeks or a £1,000 fine—or High Court powers of enforcement for contempt of court, under section 36. The problem is that Select Committees, in the modern legal world, just do not have the same powers in law to force witnesses to attend or to give evidence on oath, and nor do they have the necessary sanctions. The last time Parliament—

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ed Balls]

No. I will take the intervention from the Attorney-General next, thank you.

The last time Parliament imposed a fine for contempt of court was before the great fire of London in 1666. The last time a member of the public was imprisoned for contempt was before the Boer war. Select Committees do not have these powers.

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[Ed Balls]

The hon. Gentleman has proposed that a QC could advise the Committee; perhaps he will make that proposal later. Those important points take us down the road towards the judicial inquiry. The problem is—and this is my third objection—that experience shows that only a judge-led inquiry can ensure the necessary forensic cross-examination of witnesses, prevent witnesses from avoiding answering key questions that are important for establishing the truth and, in particular, avoid blanket refusals to answer questions on grounds of legal advice. I would be happy to take an intervention from the Attorney-General on this point, because we have seen it happen in parliamentary hearings.

The argument is that a witness before a parliamentary inquiry can say on legal advice that they will not answer a question, but in a judge-led inquiry the judge has the ability to explain to the witness why answering the question in the particular form set by him according to his legal judgment will not cross the line. Unless a judge is properly testing the boundary between self-incrimination and the answers that must be given for a proper inquiry, we cannot make progress. That would be doubly the case with the prospect of criminal investigations, which might take some years down the track. On the question of witnesses not incriminating themselves, it seems to me that the evidence shows—perhaps the Attorney-General will correct me—that it is impossible for a parliamentary inquiry to call any witness who might be implicated in the LIBOR scandal without the witness saying, “On legal advice, I will say nothing.” The inquiry cannot work like that. Only a judge can sort this out.

[Damian Collins]

Does the shadow Chancellor accept that a Select Committee can ask a witness to release information covered by client-attorney privilege, as the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport did in the phone hacking inquiry? That information cannot be requested by a public inquiry because it is covered by the same remit as a civil court. A parliamentary inquiry can request and receive information that a public inquiry cannot and, in the case of the phone hacking inquiry, that led to the production of the most significant information of the entire inquiry.

[Ed Balls]

All my experience—and there are many Members on both sides of the House who have more detailed experience than I have—is that Select Committees find it much harder than a judge-led inquiry to secure the release of necessary and essential documents and, more importantly, to find out which documents they should ask for in the first place.

Finally, and above all in our view—and I note that the Attorney-General did not correct me on the calling of witnesses, but perhaps he will advise the Chancellor for his speech—only a judge-led inquiry can truly persuade the public that the inquiry is properly independent and objective and, given the Chancellor’s behaviour, non-partisan.

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[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

The hon. Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr Godsiff) has underlined the importance of having a banking system that commands public confidence. I do not know how serious the LIBOR scandal is in relation to the ability of the banks to support jobs and growth, which we so desperately need at the moment, but it is clearly a mortal blow to the reputation of the City so we need to deal with it effectively and quickly.

I say to Front Benchers on both sides in this debate that this has not been the finest hour of the House of Commons. We have not seen the finest, highest and most principled leadership from Front Benchers of either side. Many among the public will look at the debate and scoff at our self-importance and arrogance. The City itself will be in utter despair that Front Benchers should have chosen to use this opportunity to tear chunks out of each other instead of co-operating to find a solution on which they can agree.

No solution will work unless there is consensus. I say that with a very heavy heart, having great respect for the prodigious abilities of both my right hon. Friend the Chancellor and the shadow Chancellor, as well as for their public service in the House. But I really think that we have to do better. Anybody could have seen over the past few days that the debate would be a complete car crash, and so it has been. We must seek to extract something positive from it at the end of the day.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr Tyrie) raised the tone of the debate in a laudable manner. He referred to the Marconi scandal of 1912; this is its 100th anniversary, and I will say a few words about it soon if I have time. The parallels are chilling.

First, I shall say a brief word about the powers of Select Committees. The shadow Chancellor is completely wrong—we have the powers. There is some doubt about the manner of their exercise and how we might deal with contempt, but there is no doubt that we have the powers. As Chairman of a Select Committee, I have exercised them. People are in fear of them. It does the House no service for the shadow Chancellor to go around saying that we do not have powers. That undermines the authority of the House and it is not in the interests of the House.

[Damian Collins]

I am closely following my hon. Friend’s argument. Is not the Standards and Privileges Committee currently looking at the sanction for contempt of Parliament?

[Mr Jenkin]

Actually, it is the Liaison Committee on which I serve as a Select Committee Chairman. I am personally looking into the matter and will report to the Liaison Committee next week; that will be part of our report on the powers and effectiveness of Select Committees, which we hope to produce before the end of this term. It greatly ill serves the House to denigrate the powers of Select Committees.

I am going to support the Government motion. I am not in favour of a judicial inquiry; I think it would be completely dotty to plunge us into such a lengthy procedure. However, I want to sound some warnings about the dangers that might befall a parliamentary Select Committee inquiry as proposed in the Government motion. We must be mindful, not least, that if Ministers or ex-Ministers were to be called to give evidence to try to sort out the absurd row that we have seen this afternoon, the Committee could not possibly function. Indeed, it could not possibly function if Opposition Front Benchers were determined to undermine its authority and operation.

It was highly irresponsible of the shadow Chancellor to fail to answer my question or that of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor about whether the Opposition will go on non-speaks if the motion is carried. I commend the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie), who said that even if the Opposition lose the vote, Scottish National party Members will co-operate with the inquiry. How is the House meant to make a judgment about whether to vote for the motion unless we have a clear view from the shadow Chancellor?

My hon. Friend the Member for Chichester mentioned the Marconi scandal. That occurred when Ministers—Liberal Democrat Ministers, I hasten to add, just for fun—were accused of buying and selling shares for profit—