Infected Blood Inquiry and Compensation Framework

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Thursday 24th November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson) on all the work she has done and the partnership she has built with the infected blood groups, and on her work with the Haemophilia Society that supports the all-party parliamentary group on haemophilia and contaminated blood, which would not have existed or been effective without her. I thank her very much.

When I was at university between 1963 to 1966, I read some of the monographs by the Institute of Economic Affairs. Some were interesting; some, I thought, were right. One that came after that time, in 1968, was wrong. It was called “The price of blood” and argued that a commercial market in blood markets could be useful in some cases. Richard Titmuss, the founding professor of social administration and then of social policy at the London School of Economics, where both my mother and my wife studied, wrote “The Gift Relationship”, which was published in 1970. I recommend the medical classics review published in the BMJ 2011;342;d2078—I apologise for giving a reference—where Parita Mukta gives a retrospective review of that work. Richard Titmuss considered how the altruism of the gift of blood—one person the donor and one the receiver, each not knowing the other but knowing how the system worked—did an immense amount of good.

My mother was the first person in our family to have an HIV test, because she had had a blood donation during an operation. She suspected that some of her children and grandchildren used her toothbrush, so she wondered if she was going to infect them. In 1975, my wife received eight units of blood after a medical emergency. That type of exposure is something that we are aware of, but what kindled my interest was when a close friend, a haemophiliac, received factor 8 when everyone thought it was a good prophylactic. It was backed by the Haemophilia Society and others, but it turned out to be disastrous, for reasons that the inquiry is going into —I will not get involved in that.

We have each had constituents affected by infected blood. Some, if they are lucky, are still alive, but others have died. During the time that people have been ill, they have suffered all kinds of indignities. The worst that has been described to me by constituents is that every time they go into hospital, there is a clinician they do not know and they are asked how much alcohol they consume, because liver disease can be an indication of infection or of heavy drinking. I have argued that people ought to be able to have a flag to say, “Don’t ask these questions of this person, because they have to answer them several times a year and it is deeply wrong.” People ought to be able to say, “Look at these three or four paragraphs to know who I am and what my condition is. Now treat the thing I’m bringing to you. Don’t start suspecting me, as others have, of drinking excessive amounts of alcohol.”

I believe that the Government are beginning to respond in the right way. I have often had disagreements, even with my family, about drawing a distinction between people affected by infected or contaminated blood and those affected by normal procedures going wrong. On a scale that is now being recognised, we owe a debt to the judge and his helpers, we owe a debt to Sir Robert Francis, and we owe a debt to the families, who with dignity and persistence brought this debate to the House. What the Minister says today will not be the end of it, but I hope it will be a good step along the way. I am grateful to him for being here. If we need to have another debate, I will put my name to it again.

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[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)]

I too pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson) and the Father of the House, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley), for securing this vital debate, and for fighting for justice for those affected by the contaminated blood scandal. All the Members who have made important contributions today campaign tirelessly to get affected constituents the justice that they deserve. I pay tribute to them all, and to Members who could not join us today, for keeping the pressure on the Government and delivering for the victims of the scandal.

My hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Dame Nia Griffith) highlighted that many people have been waiting for decades, and that over 300 children have died of AIDS. We must look at how we can help those children who are still living with the condition. The hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) highlighted her medical experience. The treatments that we have seen over the years, and being able to spot contaminated blood, are vital, but what about the people who were contaminated before those medical breakthroughs?

My hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) highlighted her constituent’s case, and said that this is a long, upsetting and depressing process. We have to remember that people are still living with this mentally. They are suffering daily. Think about the toll that lockdown will have had on the mental health of these people. Every day that compensation is delayed is another day that they suffer.

The hon. Member for Southport (Damien Moore), and a number of other hon. Members, said that we must think about the carers: the people who cared for their family members and loved ones. Where is their voice, and where is the justice for them? No amount of money will change the fact that many people had to bury their children. We have to remember the children. That was highlighted eloquently by my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), who passionately reminded us that, for all the statistics around the scandal, we are talking about people. We are talking about real lives, which continue to be impacted daily.

My hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) highlighted her work, and that of fantastic voluntary and charity groups that support the many families affected. Even within their financial constraints, they still do a fantastic job supporting many families up and down the country. I also pay tribute to those organisations and groups. The Haemophilia Society, the Hepatitis B Positive Trust, the Hepatitis C Trust, the Sickle Cell Society and the families of thousands of people up and down the country continue to raise awareness. They contributed to this inquiry, and have fought for justice over the past years and decades.

This is the first debate in which I have represented the Opposition Front Bench in this Chamber, but this is a topic in which I take a deep personal interest. My late mother suffered from sickle cell anaemia, and I am a sickle carrier. As a result of the disease, my mum required regular blood transfusions, which were vital to her. Without them, her life would have ended a lot earlier —she died when she was 60. The transfusions helped to ease her sickle pain, and ensured that she was able to see me and my sisters grow up, see her first grandchild, and live her life.

Today, vitally, all blood is screened to avoid the risk of the transmission of serious infection. I am pleased that that has helped more people come forward to give vital blood. Every so often, I get a ping from NHS Blood and Transplant—a call-out for people to come forward and give blood. It is vital that people give blood and know that that blood will be safe.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

The hon. Lady is making an important point. It reminds me that it was only two weeks ago that, in the Jubilee Room around the corner, there was a plea for people, especially from ethnic minorities, to register to donate blood and, potentially, organs, as many do not need them all. I agree that it is critical that people be aware of the importance of being donors, and of the gift of donations.

[Florence Eshalomi]

I totally agree with the Father of the House; that is so important. As I say, every so often, we get the ping from NHS Blood. At that NHS blood donation event, we called for a bus in Parliament, so that we could get more people here, including parliamentarians, to give blood.

Thorough screening of blood has come alongside the emergence of synthetic clotting factors for haemophilia sufferers, which eliminates the risk of contaminants from important treatments. Together, these treatments have significantly improved the safety of blood treatments in the UK, and patients now have a low risk of contracting serious diseases such as hepatitis or HIV from blood. Sadly, treatments in the ’70s and ’80s put patients at unacceptable risk of contracting serious and life-threatening diseases. In the ’70s, people with bleeding disorders had transfusion treatment replaced with the new product factor concentrate, which was then produced by pooling and concentrating tens of thousands of donors’ blood. As the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire highlighted, just one sample was enough to contaminate the entire batch, and could risk infecting thousands of people; that caused significant concern.

The tragic result was that thousands with blood and bleeding disorders were infected with deadly diseases, which had and continue to have a significant impact on their lives. Without modern, effective treatment, diseases such as HIV were acutely fatal and came with horrific consequences. Heartbreakingly, many of those infected have not lived to see today’s debate and the prospect of proper justice at the end of this inquiry. My right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North highlighted that more than 3,000 people have died, and statistics from the Terrence Higgins Trust show that between the start of the inquiry in July 2017 and February 2022, some 419 infected people have died. While we await the conclusion of this report and inquiry, one person dies every four days. This is about the human element of the inquiry; every day that we delay this compensation is justice denied to those people.

The impact of the scandal goes beyond the immediate medical concerns. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Charlotte Nichols) highlighted the stigma. We must remember the stigma that those with HIV and AIDS suffered during the ’80s and ’90s. Disgraceful racist and homophobic stereotypes were widely perpetuated, and victims were persecuted and shunned for suffering from this horrific disease.

Diseases associated with contaminated blood often impact not just the immediate victim, but their families and friends. As the primary carer for my late mother, I remember some of the challenges in the late ’90s in making sure my mum got the right treatment when she was suffering. Many of the loved ones of the victims will have gone through similar challenges in trying to get the right treatment, and victims are often misunderstood and continue to be stigmatised for having a disease.

The inquiry is finally coming to a close, and interim payments have begun to be made. It would be remiss of me to pre-empt the recommendations of the inquiry. However, I hope that the Minister has heard loudly the concerns raised by a number of Members this afternoon, and those concerns raised in other debates. I hope that he can fully address some of those clear asks when he responds. As Dame Elizabeth Anionwu—the first ever sickle cell nurse—pointed out, it can be very hard for people suffering with infectious disease, including blood contamination, to come forward because of the stigma.

Sir Robert’s report was published on 7 June 2022 and made 19 clear recommendations. It is frankly disgraceful that only one of those recommendations has been followed up. Sir Brian acknowledged that there is a moral case for the interim payments to be made. I ask the Minister to respond to a number of those claims and ensure that the victims get the payments they deserve. We cannot ignore the impact on the families and friends of victims, who fought alongside them for this justice. Can the Minister provide assurances that those groups will not be ignored when the Government finally respond to the inquiry?

The contaminated blood scandal had a life-changing impact on tens of thousands of victims who were promised the hope of effective treatment. It can only be right that they see the justice they deserve as soon as possible.

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[Alex Burghart]

I understand the right hon. Lady’s point. Sir Robert’s findings have fed into the inquiry. We are now preparing for the inquiry’s final findings and we will respond as quickly as possible.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I have perhaps interrupted the Minister as he was about to answers the question I am about to ask, but the Cabinet Office asked for the Robert Francis inquiry, not Brian Langstaff. Robert Francis’s report has been received by the Cabinet Office. Sir Brian Langstaff’s report is expected in the middle of next year. Are we seriously expected to believe that we will not hear anything more on the Government’s reaction to the Sir Robert Francis report before the middle of next year?

[Alex Burghart]

My hon. Friend the Father of the House is absolutely right that it was the Cabinet Office that asked Sir Robert to conduct the work. The findings have now been fed into the inquiry and are being considered. I draw his attention to the remarks that Sir Robert made on the BBC’s “Today” programme on 17 August. He said that the Government were considering the matter and that it was very complex. He said that they had to wait for Sir Brian’s recommendations because his own work was feeding into that inquiry, and he had given options for them to consider.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

The Minister fairly quotes Robert Francis. It would be possible for us to text Robert and ask whether he would like to us to say the following, but if the Minister can give some responses to some of Sir Robert’s recommendations before the middle of next year, would he be willing to consider doing that, please?

[Alex Burghart]

I am very happy to have that conversation. The Minister for the Cabinet Office and I are meeting the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North in the coming weeks, and I am sure that will be a central part of our discussion.

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[Alex Burghart]

For the sake of Hansard, the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire said that that meeting will be in private, but I am quite confident that at least one of the people participating will talk about it in public afterwards and that it may be the start of a longer dialogue.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

On a point of order, Dame Angela, can we take what the Minister says as a definite maybe?

[Dame Angela Eagle (in the Chair)]

It is probably not a matter for me, but I observe that in here we are on the public record, so the Minister might wish to make some comments that he knows the Public Gallery and anyone who watches our proceedings will hear, rather than relying simply on a private meeting.

Tributes to Her Late Majesty The Queen

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Friday 9th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

My constituents will wish me briefly to record their love and respect for, and gratitude to, Her late Majesty. We can give continuing life to her values and virtues, kindness, aspiration, perseverance and pride. We thank her; we miss her; and we should say what she would wish: God save the King.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the leader of the SNP, Ian Blackford.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Father of the House.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

All sides of the House should wish to help the Prime Minister to be successful in tackling the problems facing the country.

When I raised one of them in July with the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), he said that I could talk to the Housing Minister, but the Housing Minister retired within 17 minutes of hearing that. [Laughter.]

Will this Prime Minister look at why the Planning Inspectorate is able to overturn councils’ planned protections for green lungs?

And will she look at what is happening to the Goring Gap in relation to the A259 in the Worthing West and the Arundel and South Downs constituencies, because local councils have no role if they cannot protect what matters most to them?

[The Prime Minister]

I am a bit concerned about offering my hon. Friend a meeting with the Housing Minister, in case any ill should befall him. But my hon. Friend is right; there is not enough power in local hands at the moment. It is too easy for local councils to be overruled by the Planning Inspectorate, and that is certainly an issue that I expect my Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities to look at.

Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

In June 2016, there was a vote of no confidence in the then leader of the Labour party. I do not know whether the present leader of the Labour party voted yes or no. If he can remember, did he vote confidence or no confidence in his predecessor?

In 2019, his predecessor moved a motion of no confidence in the Government, saying that the issue should be put to the people. It was put to the people in the 2019 general election, and the present Government came in with a majority of 80.

I have it on reasonable authority that the deputy leader of the Labour party has said today that Boris was, in effect, the magic that helped. [Interruption.] I am glad that the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) has confirmed that.

The issue before the House now is whether people would have any more confidence in the Labour party becoming a Government, and the answer is no.

In June 2016, when the then leader of the Labour party lost the no confidence vote by 172 votes to 40—the 40 may have included the current Leader of the Opposition—20 of the shadow Cabinet had walked out, but the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) walked in. The interesting question is whether the way in which he has spoken today is part of a leadership bid to take over the Labour party properly rather than just in name.

He describes himself as red and green, but mixing red and green together produces an unpleasant kind of brown. Does he accept that the Labour party is not yet trusted by the British people?

By voting confidence in the Government, this House will be saying, as the British people did in 2019, that we prefer us in government, not them.

That is not to say that the Government have got everything right. If I were taking part in the Thursday Sir David Amess debate, I could list the things on which the Government could make changes.

I want them to drop the privatisation of Channel 4, as there is no point in it, and I want them to reconsider the question of whether the Holocaust Memorial should be in Victoria Tower Gardens. There are a number of other issues that I could take up.

The issue today is: do we want to change the party of Government, and the answer is no. I rest my case there.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the leader of the SNP.

Extreme Heat Preparedness

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

Obviously, our immediate concern is to ensure that we get the country through the next 36 hours or so in as good a shape as possible. The hon. Lady will be pleased to know that all our local resilience forums are standing up. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities joined the chairs’ call this morning, and they are meeting today to consider what steps need to be taken. There are simple behavioural things that we can all do to help protect ourselves and look out for the most vulnerable, particularly the elderly who are living alone.

The hon. Lady raised a raft of policy issues, which will no doubt be addressed in our debates on this issue in the months to come. She asked about the Prime Minister’s presence at Cobra. It is literally my job as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster to chair Cobra, particularly where the Civil Contingencies Secretariat is involved, and to brief the Prime Minister accordingly, which I did yesterday morning at 8 o’clock. It is my job to co-ordinate across the whole of Government, and that is what we have been doing. As a result, I am confident that all the guidance and support needed in schools and hospitals, and for our police forces and others involved in this effort, is working its way out through the system, and they are all standing up well. In particular, our co-operation with the devolved Administrations has been strong, which is why the public health message about the next 36 hours has landed so well.

In wider terms, as I am sure the hon. Lady will have noticed, this heatwave has not just affected the United Kingdom. It has hit the whole of continental Europe. A number of countries that in many ways are more accustomed than we are to higher temperatures are having to take similar action, and in some circumstances their populations are suffering. That is why it is so important that the UK leads on this debate globally, as we did at COP26 last year.

As the hon. Lady knows, we have launched the Energy Transition Council, with 20 Governments and 15 international institutions participating. We are working hard with countries around the world to help them to move to a cleaner future, while we also shift our own energy mix in the right direction. However, as I am sure she will appreciate, as we move towards net zero we have to strike a balance between playing our part in fighting climate change in this country and keeping the lights on for people who need that.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

May I, through a question to my right hon. Friend, put to the leaders of our public services, including the ambulance service, that if their staff do not have summer gear, they should be allowed to wear their own safe and appropriate summer gear, and ask all of them to ensure that people have good equipment and clothes for the summer, given that the temperatures are changing? It is wrong that people should only have winter gear in times like this.

[Kit Malthouse]

The Father of the House raises an extremely important point about the ability of our emergency services to cope and their resilience. Each of those organisations and their leaders will have to take that into account over the months to come. I have said to the team internally that we must learn exactly such practical lessons during this brief but nevertheless severe period of weather. I am sure we will see impacts on the transport network and elsewhere in the next 36 hours, some of which we can mitigate, but it is probably the case that not all effects will be mitigated; we should learn those lessons. My hon. Friend raises an important point for the future.

Address to Her Majesty: Platinum Jubilee

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Thursday 26th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

I stand here between two Crowns: symbols of the fact that the Queen is an important part of the lawmaking process.

We thank the Leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister for the way they have introduced the debate. The Leader of the Opposition referred to his knighthood. Last evening at Drapers’ Hall, Richard Luce, now Lord Luce, former Lord Chamberlain to the Queen, spoke for her platinum jubilee in the presence of the Earl of Wessex. Drapers’ Hall is where the Queen was admitted as a senior member of the Court. Some years after, she attended the opening of Drapers’ Academy in east London. Two pupils had school dinner with her and were asked what that was like. They said, “It was all right when we asked her what it was like during the war.”

The Queen has become the person we all know her to have been. She has been through more things than all the rest of us have in our lifetimes. I was calculating that the senior Member of this House, the right hon. Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) who was elected before me, and I have served on and off for two-thirds of her reign. When I was first elected, Sir Bernard Braine was the Member for the overseas territories and dependencies. There have been others who have fulfilled that role. We are not just speaking for this country; we are speaking for the dependencies as well. I am very glad that Mr Speaker is able to be in the Falkland Islands, and we send him our best wishes and thanks for doing that.

On the human side, when my wife and I were living in south London, the Queen’s Equerry, Patrick Plunket, bought a house nearby. He sadly died early, and the Queen and Prince Philip very kindly came to a birthday party for Robin Plunket, the brother. I have never seen such a fast gathering of prams and children to provide a guard of honour for one of the Queen’s informal visits. She just attracted people and spoke to them all with the kind of inclusiveness which we can occasionally see at the garden parties, when 8,000 of her closest friends come together several times a year.

It is also notable that the Queen has been on the throne 70 years. It is 69 years, I think, since the coronation. I was one of the people, aged eight, sleeping out in the Mall. I end with this: for those who may get involved in quiz questions about the Queen and even the coronation, the person with Queen Sālote of Tonga was Ibrahim IV, the Sultan of Kelantan in Malaysia, not the person in Noël Coward’s joke. We wish her well.

Debate on the Address

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Tuesday 10th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

May I say to the parliamentary leader of the SNP, the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), that it is a delight to follow him? Sometimes it is more of a delight to precede him. Today, I might just remind him that the electorate do not always vote in the same numbers, in the same way. Between 2010 and 2015, the SNP vote went up. It went up after it lost the referendum. By 2017, its vote had gone down by about 26%. It is worth while looking through his notes, some of which he gave us this afternoon, to check how the figures change; they may change again.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Will the Father of the House give way?

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I will not at the moment. So far, I have only spoken about the speech of the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber; I have not started giving mine.

Nothing I will say need detain the Prime Minister or the Leader of the Opposition if they want to go off—I know that they have had hard days—but what I want to say is that I am concerned about people’s home lives.

Two small changes for owners of park homes would make a great deal of difference. In 2010, the then Housing Minister said that there would be park home reform; we have not had it. We should ensure that pitch fee increases are in line with the consumer prices index, rather than the retail prices index. That change could be incorporated in the next Finance Bill, and I hope that will happen.

The second change is on the question of commissions. Why should park home residents have to lose a significant part of their home’s value when they sell it? Those two things can be changed quite simply, the second probably through a handout Bill. There are plenty of MPs who could take that forward if their number came up in the ballot— my number has not come up in the ballot in 46 years —but the Government can make the RPI/CPI change quite easily.

From the notes to the Queen’s Speech—I thank the Government for giving us copious notes on the proposals—we learn that the numbers of social tenants, private tenants and leaseholders are each about 4 million to 4.6 million.

The fastest-growing type of home occupation is leasehold. We will not get decent information from the last census, because the only choices that people could put down were whether they owned their home or were a tenant. When I asked what a leaseholder should say, I was not given a clear answer. People think they own their home and might say, “I own it”, but they are wrong. If they put down “tenant”, they might think, “I’m not, actually. I’m a leaseholder.” Why could the people who compiled that census question not wake up to the fact that we are talking about 4.6 million households? Actually, it is probably 6 million, to be complete, but let us take it as 4.6 million. Why did the Office for National Statistics and what is now the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities agree a question that does not allow accurate answers and totals to be given?

On leasehold, over the years, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has commissioned the Law Commission to write reports on what would make life easier, fairer and cheaper. We have not had legislation on that put forward. There are words about how something will happen in this Parliament, and we know that uncontroversial legislation often comes in what is expected to be the last year of a Parliament, but that legislation can often be lost if the election comes early. Let us assume that the election comes in May 2024. Will those 4.6 million leaseholders be left hanging if legislation, having been proposed, does not get through both Houses of Parliament?

I ask the Government to try to get that legislation ready for the next Session, and to get it through Parliament early as a priority. I suspect that it could start in the House of Lords and come through to the House of Commons quickly, rather than us having the controversial stuff start here.

I have spent about 15 years—I am following others who have been doing it for longer—trying to get justice for leaseholders. The crooks, exploiters and heartless people in the field—the sort of people on whom one could justifiably use parliamentary privilege—need to be held back, and the ordinary people need to be brought forward.

In debates on the Building Safety Act 2022, we heard how many people were stuck; the Government eventually came round to making changes, which are welcome. On fire safety defects, we know that we have to find, fix and fund the problems, and then get the money back from those who have not yet coughed up.

Lastly, I turn to planning. Someone has started parliamentary petition 611113 about banning development on farmland. In the last week, it has been signed by more than 700 of my constituents, and many others. The person who wrote to me, who is not a constituent, said that a migrating bird coming to the south coast might think, “I’ve got to the coast, so I can rest,” but if there is a solid wall of housing between the south coast and the South Downs, it will have to go on miles more. That should not be happening.

I put this plea, through the Prime Minister, to the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. It is about an appeal against a planning decision. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities had an inspector who was about to approve the protection of Chatsmore farm, which is at the Goring gap, between Goring and Ferring, one of which is in Worthing, while the other is under Arun District Council. Much to everyone’s surprise, a second inspector allowed the building of more than 400 homes on one of the few agricultural fields between the South Downs and the coast on the west side of Worthing.

The judicial review of that decision is now to be heard in the High Court. I ask the Government not to oppose the judicial review, and not to oppose the overturning of the decision. I ask them to cancel the decision, or at least let the Court cancel it, and to say that they will never again allow two inspectors to toss a coin to decide on the development of major farmland—on development in one of the few fields in a built-up area.

If we want local democracy, we need to trust local councils. Even if we cannot trust local councils—I frankly do—we cannot trust an inspectorate that allows two inspectors to make decisions that are incompatible with each other’s responsibilities.

I know that the political success of the Labour party in Worthing will lead to a new leader of the council, but I am delighted that the present leader of the Labour group on the council came to the Goring gap at my invitation to make a speech in favour of asking the Government to solve the problem. The Leader of the Opposition has visited a couple of times, once telling people that he was coming, and once not telling them. I do not mind him not telling me, but he did not even tell members of the local Labour party, and they wanted a photograph. Things have changed since then. I hope that he and the Government can see sense and protect the Goring gap, Chatsmore farm and local democracy.

Referral of Prime Minister to Committee of Privileges

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Thursday 21st April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

Part of this is about the Prime Minister. My habit over 46 years has been not to make a public or private comment about a party leader, whether mine or someone else’s, and I do not propose to change that now. If I have something to say to a Prime Minister, I say it directly, as I did first with Harold Wilson, and have done with most other Prime Ministers since then.

My preference would be to back the amendment, but if it is not going to be moved, I cannot do so. This is not the right time for the House to make a decision. The words in the amendment are ones that I would support, and I am sorry that the House will not be able to consider them. I may be in the minority in that, but that is not a problem in the House; it happens to a lot of people.

The words in the third paragraph of the Prime Minister’s statement on Tuesday spell out the situation: he said that he did not think, in effect, that it was a party, or that the rules had been broken. He now accepts that the situation has been judged differently by the police. I do not think we should build a great big cake on top of that admission and acceptance; the House would do better to leave it like that.

It would also be better—I am not challenging you, Mr Speaker—if the House decided that the reference to the Committee on Privileges should be made when all the information is available from the Cabinet Office report and the results of the police investigation.

The last thing I want to say—without attacking the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting)—is that those who heard the “Today” programme this morning heard repeated references to the local government elections on 5 May. Whatever the Leader of the Opposition says, part of what is before the House today is a straightforward attempt to gain party political advantage, and I intend to have no part of that.

[Mr Speaker]

We now come to the leader of the Scottish National party, Ian Blackford.

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[Matt Western]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is absolutely right. This notion of trust is so fragile and so precious. For those who were around in the 2000s, in the run-up to the expenses scandal and other issues that have affected this House, the primacy of trust in this place is critical to how it operates.

If we are to restore faith and trust in this place, we cannot defend the indefensible. The Government tried that with the Owen Paterson affair. I really felt for Conservative Members, the Back Benchers particularly, who were humiliated by what they were led through by the Prime Minister. We must restore the standards and principles of this place and we must have adhesion to the ministerial code, which has to be brought on to a different legal setting.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I think the big distinction with Owen Paterson is that, when outside investigation showed what he had done was wrong, he did not accept it.

[Matt Western]

I thank the Father of the House for his intervention and I accept the point he makes, but I am not entirely sure that the Prime Minister has fully accepted that he has misled this place.

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[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

I start by wishing Her Majesty a very happy birthday, not just because it is the right thing for us to do, but because we reflect on a lifetime of service and the kind of leadership that we all aspire to emulate, putting duty and self-sacrifice before everything else for the country that she so obviously loves and has served so well for many decades.

It looks as though the motion will go through today, as it should. What a shame we are even having this debate; as some Members have mentioned, it feels like a waste of time. We should be talking about the cost of living and how we can help our constituents to make ends meet and to afford the rent, mortgage, bills and to put food on the table. We should be talking about the outrageous onslaught on Ukraine by the evil, murderous tyrant Putin and how we can support the Ukrainian people. So many other issues are equally important to each of our communities, yet here we are talking about this issue because we have a Prime Minister who will not take responsibility. That is deeply sad.

We have heard many offensive things over the past few months. The most offensive is, “People have moved on. Can’t you just get over it?” I had Easter Sunday off. I went to church in the morning and then a few of us went for a beer at a café at Levens Hall in my patch. It was very sunny, as it always is in the Lake district, as Members all know—that might be knowingly misleading the House, actually. Anyway, it was a lovely day and we sat outside. An elderly couple came up to me, and the gentleman said to me, “My wife’s sister died in June of 2020. She died alone, we could not visit her. Please don’t let him get away with it.” That is a reminder that what we are talking about, as much as anything else, is justice being done.

Earlier on, the Father of the House was the first of a number of people to say that we should not be talking about this as a local election issue as somehow that diminishes it.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

It may have come across like that. The Leader of the Opposition repeatedly said that it was not party political, and I was drawing attention to what his colleague had repeatedly said on the “Today” programme this morning. That is all I said.

[Tim Farron]

I am grateful to the Father of the House for that clarification. My point absolutely stands: this is only a local election issue—and it is—because the Conservative party has not delivered the justice that it was in its hands to deliver.

My patch has an interesting history. It was Conservative for 100 years until we won it in 2005. We had some great wins and some narrow wins, and there is one ward that we have never won, even in my best years—although perhaps they are ahead of me, who knows? I was knocking on doors in that ward and met a couple who had sometimes voted Conservative, had normally voted UK Independence party and had voted Brexit party but had never voted for us. They told me that they were going to vote for us in the local elections because it was the only way they could think of to deliver justice. They felt weak and powerless because of a man with whom they agreed on many issues who they felt could no longer lead the country because of that lack of integrity.

We are two years on from when many of those things took place. Our memories can play tricks on us, we move on and we do not live in the moment of those times. They were not pleasant, and we choose to forget them to a degree, don’t we? However, it is important that we do not forget what that meant, not just for the elderly couple I spoke to on Sunday, but for many others—for hundreds of people that we know. For weeks on end, I wrote letters of commiseration to people who had lost loved ones. We all did that. There were people who could not be with a dying parent or a dying child. There were people who spent Christmas alone, and for many of them it was their last Christmas. It was so hard to explain to young children why their birthday parties could not take place. We went through all sorts of privations.

Gill Haigh, the chief exec of Cumbria Tourism, and I argued to stop people visiting the Lake district, even though we knew it was ruining our economy, because we believed in the health, safety and wellbeing of the people who would have come and of those who work in the community. Sacrifices were made and the Prime Minister made laws that we agreed with and that were important. Why? To save lives, to protect the NHS, to do the right British thing and look after one another, and to love our neighbour. Yet within hours, it appears, the ink drying on his edicts, he was habitually breaking them. There is no question but that this was and is a resignation matter.

Speaker’s Statement

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

May I say through you, Mr Speaker, and through the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) the mother of Amy, Joe and Harry, that the personal was very well covered in St Margaret’s two days ago? The political has been covered by the press and by Gordon Brown when he spoke at the service. I would like to contribute a parliamentary word and a trade union one.

The parliamentary one is that Jack showed what can be achieved if, by chance, you cannot have ministerial office during your time here. For those who come here thinking that being a Minister is the only thing that matters, they are wrong.

Secondly, I believe that if we could have more people who have had serious, continued trade union experience coming into this House, the House of Commons would be better for it, and I hope that that will not just be on one side of the House.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

Over recent months, we have been forced to gather here far too often to remember colleagues who, very sadly and often suddenly, have been lost to this Parliament.

Jack Dromey is another Member of this House who has gone well before his time. On behalf of myself and my colleagues in the Scottish National party, I want to extend our deepest sympathies to all who knew and loved Jack. My thoughts, of course, are most especially with the Mother of the House; she has lost a constant companion at her side. She and the family bear the biggest burden of the loss of someone who was at the very centre of all their lives.

I would also like to extend sympathy to Jack’s beloved party, because we all know he was a Labour man through and through. I will also remember Jack as one of the feistiest campaigners in this place—a man rooted in trade union politics, rooted in the rights of workers, and a man who never lost an ounce of that spirit when he entered this Parliament. That fighting spirit extended to causes and campaigns far and wide, and I know that it extended to strikes and protests in Scotland, too. He was a true friend of Scottish workers and a champion of workers everywhere.

Jack was true to the cause and that is probably why he was so good at working cross-party and winning support and friendship across this place. My friend, the former Member of this place, Neil Gray, worked very closely with him on the Pension Schemes Act 2021 and he still speaks so fondly about Jack’s determination and his passion to make sure that that Bill was amended. He would often bound up the stairs to my office to seek my and my party’s support for various campaigns not just for him, but more often, for Harriet.

I will finish by sharing one story that I read about Jack, which I thought was both very telling and very touching. Apparently, a few years ago, a great admirer of the Mother of the House from the feminist movement approached Jack and said, “I always feel a bit nervous around Harriet—I am so in awe of her,” only for Jack to reply, “Me too. Even after all these years.” Today, we can assure Jack and his family that many of us were in awe of him, too. We deeply admired the way he conducted himself and the way he carried himself every day of his life. He left his gentle mark on so many and he will be greatly missed. May he now rest in peace. God bless you, Jack.

Committee on Standards: Decision of the House

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Monday 8th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

It would be tempting for each of us on all sides of the House to get into a mud bath and start throwing things at each other. We could go back in time—I have got a little list as well—but I do not think this is the right time. I congratulate the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) on requesting this debate, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) for saying last week that he thought we ought to have it. I think there is cross-party support for what we are doing now. The only positive thing I can say to the Government on this is that if they think they are going to make a mistake in future, they should talk to me first and we can make it together.

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House on acknowledging on Thursday that things had been done wrong and need putting right. I am sorry to speak in advance of the Chair of the Committee on Standards because I would like to know what are the terms of his motion that could restore the consequences of the vote that we ought to have taken, and the way we ought to have taken it, on Wednesday. It is clear that the House should have backed the Committee, and we need to find a way of showing that. We ought to acknowledge that in future, those who resign from Parliament, whether they are a Government or an Opposition Member, should not leave without making a decision on a firm recommendation from the Committee on Standards, with Members of Parliament and with independent members. We must find a way of making that plain. My right hon. Friends the Leader of the House and the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster say that there is widespread support for reforming the system. I am not part of that support. I believe the system does work, can work, and should work. I would be interested to know what the Committee on Standards wants to recommend, and I will look at that with an open mind. Just because it was right for me 18 years ago when I sat on the Committee with Martin Bell, does not mean it cannot be improved.

As well as responding to what we ought to have done on Wednesday—that is the point of this debate—I would like to hear how the Government will respond to Lord Evans’s report that came out this week. It has four and a half pages of recommendations. This afternoon is not the time to go through those, but we ought to have a coherent approach that helps to ratchet up our observance and recognition of standards. Some have introduced the question of whether MPs should have outside jobs, besides being Members of Parliament. We have 100 or so who are Ministers, so they have an extra job as well as being a Member of Parliament. One example I often use is Peter Thurnham, who when made redundant set up his own business and became a successful engineering business owner. Should he have had to give that up? Should Michael Foot have given up his writing or his royalties when he was here? I think we should take great care about that.

I believe that any Member of Parliament who declares outside earnings should do so not just in writing, but face to face with the registrar. They should explain what they are doing, and could be reminded what the limits are of what they do. The one thing I would say to the face of my former colleague, Owen Paterson, is that if we take on a consultancy with a business, the one thing we know is that we cannot do anything that could be interpreted as lobbying or in the interests of that business.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I declare a small earning as a musician outside this House—[Interruption.] It is very small. Should an additional point about public appointments perhaps be part of this debate—we could add it to the excellent list put forward by the Leader of the Opposition? Is there real concern that the Government’s attitude towards public appointments is straying away from the rules as overseen by the Commissioner for Public Appointments? In particular, with the forthcoming appointment for the chair of Ofcom, the whole process is being run, rerun, truncated and, frankly, there are suspicions that it is being tricked up to favour a particular candidate.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I am biased in favour of Paul Dacre because he and I were working to get the killers of Stephen Lawrence charged and convicted. If I was asked whether he is the right person to chair Ofcom I would say no, but I have not been asked.

Many will want to speak in this debate, Mr Speaker, so I will try not to repeat myself. I believe that the present system can work if we make it work. Those of us who find that others have taken a different view to the propriety of what we have done ought to trust their judgment more than we trust our own, and not just go on saying, “I thought I was right at the time.” We can each do things that are wrong. If we do we should say so, say sorry, and try to let the House move on. That way we can ratchet up the standards of our achievements, as well as of our behaviour.