Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Damian Collins and Michael Fabricant

Monday 9th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

What steps her Department is taking to stop migrants crossing the English Channel illegally; and if she will make a statement.

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

What steps her Department is taking to stop migrants crossing the English Channel illegally.

Privileges

Debate between Damian Collins and Michael Fabricant

Tuesday 2nd April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Damian Collins]

That is ultimately a matter for the House to determine. Let us look at other jurisdictions. I believe that the United States Congress, for example, can impose a fine or a custodial sentence of up to three months, and I believe that the Scottish Parliament has something similar, but Members will correct me if that is not the case. Other legislatures have processes that include clear sanctions in law that can be applied if a reasonable request for a witness to appear or for documents to be served has not been met. I do not believe that politicians should sit in judgment over private citizens and start ordering those penalties, however. It is probably right that some independent outside body should do that, as happens in other areas of public life. We should determine what our role should be, and if we believe that a reasonable request has been made for a witness to appear or for papers to be issued to a Committee, that should be done. It is reasonable to expect someone who has been asked to give evidence to a Committee to do so honestly and truthfully. If it is proved that they are lying to or misleading the Committee, there should be some sanction for that as well. There is then a separate debate about who should enforce that sanction and what the penalty should be, but if we use these powers responsibly and we expect people to comply with them, there has to be some sanction if they do not do so, as in the case of Mr Cummings.

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

I am following this argument with great interest. Given the nature of Dominic Cummings—incidentally, I do not think the way he has behaved towards the Select Committee is any different from the way he behaves generally—does my hon. Friend agree that there is a real danger that he would regard an admonishment from the House of Commons as a badge of honour? Does he also agree that we need some form of alternative measure so that future witnesses will not think that an admonishment is the only thing they might have to face?

[Damian Collins]

My hon. Friend is right; that is an important point. There has to be some penalty. For some people, that would involve damage to their reputation. Someone who is running a public body or a regulated industry, for example, might find that their reputation was damaged because they had behaved in a way that was inconsistent with upholding the high standards of their office. Clearly, Dominic Cummings does not seem to care about those things. We need to ask whether someone who has been found in contempt of Parliament and admonished by Parliament would be an appropriate candidate to hold a public position such as a Government adviser or a member of a public body in the future. Should there be a bar on that?

[Damian Collins]

Absolutely; my hon. Friend and fellow member of the Committee makes an excellent point. That is a good example of people finding themselves in a situation of which they are the cause, and of clear penalties being in place that can restrict their future actions and activities, although not necessarily their liberty. Someone who has been found in contempt of the House should face some sort of real-world sanction that takes into account their appropriateness to be a fit and proper person to hold certain positions and roles, and certainly to be appointed to public office. For example, if Mr Cummings were ever again asked to be a Government adviser or special adviser, these sorts of things should be taken into account, and I am sure that they would be.

There needs to be a further sanction in law as well, including a range of penalties depending on the severity of the offence, with someone in authority to adjudicate and enforce those sanctions. As the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) has said, there should be a clear process so that we can understand how long it should take and, ideally, a witness could be compelled to come within the scope of an inquiry, rather than doing as I believe Dominic Cummings intended to do, which was to offer to come here at some point in the future, knowing full well that that could be one or two years later. Indeed, I do not believe that the conditions he set out in his initial email have yet been met, so he probably still would not come before the Committee, more than a year later. We have to consider whether that is in any way acceptable, because it massively impedes the work of parliamentary Committees if they cannot summon witnesses who are relevant to their inquiries. In his case, we were asking him to come here in direct response to evidence that the Committee had received that was relevant to him and to our inquiry. We had very strong grounds for asking him to come.

[Michael Fabricant]

I am slightly concerned about one more thing, which was touched on earlier when my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Sir Hugo Swire) mentioned Rupert Murdoch. There was a serious criminal inquiry into Vote Leave going on at the time that my hon. Friend is talking about. Surely he would have some sympathy if there was a danger that someone appearing before the Committee might prejudice their own defence, should a criminal investigation then occur.

[Damian Collins]

Those conditions certainly applied in the case of Rupert Murdoch, because he was asked expressly what he knew about the practice of phone hacking at his newspapers, as was Rebekah Brooks, who gave evidence on the same day. That was a major part of the hearing. Those people could have used that excuse. There are different questions involved here. The right to non-incrimination for someone who is likely to face court proceedings and be charged with a particular offence, or who has already been charged, is already covered by the House’s sub judice rules. There are already clear rules in place for that. In this case, however, Mr Cummings had not been directly charged with an offence, although there were other ongoing investigations. As I have said, we agreed with other witnesses that there were certain things that we would not discuss as being on topic, so as not to interfere with other ongoing inquiries. Nevertheless, we managed to conduct a proper hearing with those witnesses and gain valuable evidence from them. There is no reason why that could not have been done in Mr Cummings’s case.