Constitution and Home Affairs

Richard Burden Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Yes, the Government do support a yes vote in that referendum. As for the referendum’s timing, as the hon. Gentleman may know, the Secretary of State for Wales and the First Minister are meeting today, with a view to identifying a date—most likely, in the first few months of next year—to hold that referendum.

Here in London, as we strengthen Parliament, we must of course ensure that we have cleaned it up, too. Radical steps have already been taken to put in place a new expenses regime. Although the way that the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority is working in its early days may be controversial to some hon. Members on both sides of the House, I am sure that everyone agrees that public confidence in how MPs are paid is absolutely crucial. Our personal arrangements should never be so grossly out of step with those of our constituents, and I know that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House is already talking to IPSA about how we can move away from the generous final salary pension scheme enjoyed by Members of the House.

Expenses were only ever the tip of the iceberg. The influence of big money runs much deeper. It is time to finish what was started three years ago in the cross-party talks on party funding. Every party has had its own problems, but we all now have an opportunity to draw a line under them, so we will seize that opportunity. We will pursue a detailed agreement on limiting donations and reforming party funding to remove big money from politics for good.

Equally, we all remember the outrage felt in all parts of the House at the lobbying scandals that unfolded just a few months ago, before the general election. Much lobbying activity is perfectly legitimate. Much of it serves an important function, allowing different organisations and charities to make representations to Parliament, but it is a process—I am sure everyone agrees on this—that must be made completely transparent. We are committed to ensuring that transparency and we will introduce a statutory register of lobbyists.

Finally, if, once all those reforms are in place, there are individual parliamentarians who still break the rules, we will also guarantee that the House of Commons is not a safe house. We will introduce legislation to ensure that, where it has been proven that a Member has been engaged in serious wrongdoing, their constituents will have the right to organise a petition to force a by-election.

When people have been let down by their MP in that way, they must not be made to wait until the next election to cast their judgment, but I also want to be clear: recall will not collapse into some tit-for-tat game between party political rivals, with parties seeking to oust each other through those petitions. When MPs are accused of doing something seriously wrong, they are entitled—everyone is entitled in the House—to expect a fair and due process to determine their innocence or guilt. That is why I certainly would not be content for a body composed only of MPs, as the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges was, to be the sole route by which we decide an MP’s culpability. That is why we are looking into exactly what would be the fairest, most appropriate and most robust trigger. I shall outline those plans very soon.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

May I take the Deputy Prime Minister back from recall of MPs to the issue of recall of Governments? I am still not entirely sure that he answered the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan). I understand the point that the Deputy Prime Minister is making about there needing to be a 50 per cent. majority vote of no confidence. The issue under debate is how that would trigger a general election. Will he explain why the Government appear to have hit on a figure that bears a dramatic resemblance to their own figures and their own strength, rather than the general party balance in Parliament? Why that figure?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I have already explained, and the hon. Gentleman must accept, that, clearly, there needs to be a different figure for the motion of no confidence, which stands, and the figure for dissolution—a new right for Parliament.

I have also explained that, when we table the legislation, we will of course ensure that no Government can fall between those two things—a motion of no confidence and a vote of dissolution. We will, as is the case in many other parliamentary systems, set out how we can avoid a limbo in which a Government do not enjoy the confidence of the House yet a vote has not taken place, or cannot take place, to dissolve Government. That is what we will do. Instead of constantly seeking to see plots around every single corner, driven by a touch of party paranoia, I ask the hon. Gentleman to relax and wait until he has seen the legislation. Then we can have the debate.