Referral of Prime Minister to Committee of Privileges

Debate between Felicity Buchan and Keir Starmer

Thursday 21st April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Keir Starmer]

I will in a minute; I have given way a lot and I want to make some progress, but I will try to come back to the hon. Member.

[Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)]

Will the right hon. and learned Member give way?

[Keir Starmer]

I will make some progress and try to come back to hon. Members when I can.

The conventions and the traditions that we are debating are not an accident. They have been handed down to us as the tools that protect Britain from malaise, extremism and decline. That is important, because the case against the Prime Minister is that he has abused those tools, that he has used them to protect himself rather than our democracy, and that he has turned them against all that they are supposed to support. Government Members know that the Prime Minister has stood before the House and said things that are not true, safe in the knowledge that he will not be accused of lying because he cannot be. He stood at the Dispatch Box and point-blank denied that rule breaking took place when it did, and as he did so he was hoping to gain extra protection from our good faith that no Prime Minister would ever deliberately mislead this House. He has used our faith and our conventions to cover up his misdeeds.