Standards in Public Life

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab)]

My Lords, like other noble Lords I start by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Bew, for initiating this debate. I agree with many if not all of the points made. In three minutes, however, it is difficult to get across all the points that you want to make. I thank the Committee on Standards in Public Life for commissioning the preparation and publication of this report, which is one of a series that it has produced since 2004. Like my noble friend Lady Donaghy and the noble Lord, Lord Bew, I very much regret the withdrawal of funding for this survey in future years.

The report confirmed for me a number of things that I had suspected about public attitudes to standards in public life. While some of these perceptions might not always be fair, as politicians and people in public life we often do not do ourselves any favours. I noted that in 2012 MPs and Ministers were evaluated less favourably than all other categories, with the exception of tabloid journalists. The expenses scandal in 2010 certainly affected in a negative way public attitudes towards politicians, and levels of trust and confidence have not returned to the levels seen before then.

I am of the opinion that people who go into public life and who seek elected office, at whatever level, do so with the best intentions, and that in this House, in the other place, in other parliaments and assemblies, and, as my noble friend Lord Martin of Springburn said, in council chambers, good men and women are seeking to make things better. We can and should debate, discuss and even argue what that should be. That is what a healthy democracy does.

The report also highlighted how we need a strong media to hold people to account and showed that 70% of people believe that the media will generally uncover wrongdoing. It was pleasing to read that people generally felt they would be treated fairly by people providing public services. There are high standards in the public sector and we are well served by people who work there. We also have remedies to deal with issues when things go wrong. Being able to correct things and provide redress is part of the confidence in how you know that you will be treated.

Will the Minister tell the House what action the Government intend to take following the publication of this report? In particular, will he tell the House, as the noble Lord, Lord Hennessy, highlighted, what the Government intend to do to deal with people’s feeling of disconnection from the political system and political parties? This is one of the most worrying findings of the report and it is incumbent on the Government to ensure that we have conditions in place to allow healthy parties to thrive.

I again thank the noble Lord, Lord Bew, for enabling us to debate this important issue tonight.