Respect Policy

Debate between Kevin Barron and Viscount Thurso

Monday 14th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[John Thurso (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

May I place on the record the thanks of the House of Commons Commission to the Chair of the Committee on Standards, the right hon. Member for Rother Valley (Kevin Barron), for his and the Committee’s work on this very important matter? As with everything it does, the Committee took it extremely seriously, put in a lot of work and came up with something that is thought through and detailed, and does exactly the job we had hoped it would do.

I want to pick up on two of the right hon. Gentleman’s points. The first is that it is absolutely essential that the policy is fair to all parties. It is vital that the House has a respect policy that looks after staff, but it is equally of the utmost importance that it is one in which Members have full buy-in and can feel confident, because otherwise it would not be fair to both sides. The second point is that there are no outstanding complaints at this time. By far the majority of Members treat the staff with the courtesy and respect that they so richly deserve. When it is made clear to them, most Members who have from time to time been errant in their behaviour immediately apologise to the members of staff concerned. The policy is as much a preventive measure as something to deal with a problem, and it puts us into the category of best practice employers. The way in which the right hon. Gentleman framed the opening of the debate is very much what the Commission had hoped for.

I will briefly set out why the policy is so important to the Commission. The Commission is of course the statutory legal employer of House staff, and it therefore has a very important duty of care towards them. Without effective policies on bullying and harassment, the House is more vulnerable to legal charges. There are of course policies in place for bullying and harassment of members of staff by their line managers and employers and for relations between Members and Members’ staff, but there is a gap between members of the House service and Members of the House in that, as was pointed out, we are rather more customers than employers. In that respect, the problem is that unlike the customers of most establishments, who can be shut out by the establishment’s owner if they are felt to be bullying or harassing the staff, it would be unthinkable for Members to be excluded. We therefore require a policy that works, and the respect policy seeks to address that situation.

Notwithstanding the fact that occurrences are very rare, some 7% of staff—nearly 100—experienced some form of harassment, according to a survey of staff, in the previous 12 months. For one in six of those affected, the harassment took the form of repeated incidents involving the same individual. The proportions are small, but that suggests that something like 20 to 25 House staff may experience ongoing problems with one or more individuals.

As the Committee’s report sets out, the policy initially agreed by the Commission in June 2011 proved to be flawed. It was based on policies used by other employers, but it did not fully take into account the special relationship that exists between House staff and Members. I reiterate that the Commission is very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for taking on this unenviable task. We believe that it has produced something that provides a proper mechanism for dealing with the rare circumstance of the most serious cases. The Committee has concluded that the revised policy is fair to all parties, as I have mentioned. On that basis, the Commission both thanks the Committee and commends the policy to the House for its endorsement.

I should note that, assuming the House agrees to the motion, the policy will come into effect immediately, but it will not be retrospective.

[Kevin Barron]

The hon. Gentleman says that the policy will not be retrospective. However, if somebody has a difficult relationship at the moment, something that has gone on during the past few days, weeks or months might be added to a complaint to the commissioner if she felt that it ought to be investigated. There are no such cases whatever to my knowledge, but just in case there are, I thought that we should mention that the policy would be retrospective in relation to such behaviour over many months or years that is considered at some point in the future.

[John Thurso]

I am most grateful to the Chair of the Committee for intervening to make that point. Of course, at the moment no complaints are extant, so there will be nothing retrospective about complaints that we know about and have dealt with. However, if a complaint is made now, it will of course be subject to this policy.

The House greatly values its staff and the exceptional work that they do in supporting us all. An effective respect policy is a very important part of delivering the Commission’s aim to be exemplary employer. I commend the policy to the House.