Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority

Lord Jackson of Peterborough Excerpts

Tuesday 4th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I wish to say a little about what the new board members are going to do in terms of getting trained and educated about what we do in this House. Their statutory responsibility is to determine Members’ pay and allowances—I emphasise the word “allowances” because that is the expression in the statute, although that is not how it has been interpreted by the current board and its chairman.

It is surely important that anybody who is looking at terms of pay and conditions should understand a bit about the job of the people whose pay and conditions they are sitting in judgment over. As you may know, Mr Deputy Speaker, on the morning of 22 November this year the current chairman of IPSA, who sat on the board that selected the four candidates whose names are before the House tonight, told the “Today” programme that he knew a lot about what Members of Parliament did in their constituencies, but admitted to ignorance about what they did in this great House of Commons. That is after three years in the position, which he holds for only five years. In other words, after 66% of his time in post, he still admits that he is ignorant. He said that the only thing he knew about what Members of Parliament did was that they attended, as he put it, “a zoo” on a Wednesday. Later that day, I asked my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House whether he would organise a programme of education for Sir Ian Kennedy. He assured me that Sir Ian had always shown a willingness and desire to learn more about the work of the House, and obviously put him in a strong position to be able to show leadership to the new members of the board.

Pursuant to that, I wrote to Sir Ian on the following day, 23 November, setting out in detail everything that I had done in this House on Thursday 22 November, including asking a question about him. That covered the time between about 8.30 am and after 10 o’clock at night, when I returned to my constituency home. In the letter, which I said I was quite prepared to have treated as an open letter, I invited him to come along and shadow me for a day in the House so that I could show him exactly what we do here because he is so ignorant of it. I had assumed that by now, in the knowledge that we were having this debate, which my right hon. Friend flagged up when he responded to my business question, the chairman of IPSA would have responded to me, but he has not yet done so. I therefore wonder whether he really is interested in finding out what we do here. I hope that other members of the board will have a greater appetite for learning about it before they feel able to comment on our pay, allowances and pensions.

[Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)]

On the subject of pay and conditions, and the transparency and probity that IPSA is responsible for upholding in this place, does my hon. Friend deprecate, as I do, the fact that despite a very strong lead from the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and the Government, IPSA set its face against that policy in paying its interim chief executive, through a tax-avoiding personal service company, the sum of £39,000?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I said that this is a very narrow motion, and that is certainly way outside its scope.

[Mr Jackson]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The comments that I made relate specifically to the duties and responsibilities of board members, which are to protect the probity, honesty and transparency of this place, and I would respectfully submit that that is in order.