Prorogation (Disclosure of Communications)

Victoria Prentis Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Grieve]

No, I can think of no such event. Indeed, it is the Treasury Solicitor’s Department and the Law Officers’ job to make sure that anything the Government say in litigation fulfils their duty of candour and is not misleading.

Then a most remarkable thing happened, Mr Speaker, and this is where it becomes more difficult for me. In the course of the days that followed I started to be given information from public officials informing me that they believed the handling of this matter smacked of scandal—there is no other way to describe it. Of course, that places me in a difficulty, because it is simply the information that I have been given. I want to make absolutely clear that I am not in a position—any more, I think, than any Member of this House—to be able to ascertain whether that information is mistaken. I can only say that I believe those sources to be reliable. Also, in my experience it is extraordinarily unusual that I should get such approaches, with individuals expressing their disquiet about the handling of a matter and some of the underlying issues to which it could give rise.

It is as a consequence of that that I have drafted, along with right hon. and hon. Friends and other Members, the Humble Address concerning the Prorogation documents. I want to emphasise at the outset that in doing so and identifying named individuals, whether they be special advisers, who make up the vast majority, or one in case a civil servant, I am making absolutely no imputation against any single one of them whatever. It would be disgraceful to do so, because I do not have the evidence on which to do it.

[Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)]

My right hon. and learned Friend and I have worked together, originally as master and pupil and then as Attorney General and civil servant. We have a great deal of history in this matter. Does he agree that there are civil service mechanisms and systems for guiding the behaviour of civil servants, and that these matters are ideally best not discussed in the manner in which we are discussing them this afternoon?

[Mr Grieve]

My hon. Friend is right about our long association. She is also right, of course, having worked in the Treasury Solicitor’s Department, where I am quite sure she maintained at all times the highest standards of integrity. The difficulty, however, is this: 31 October is looming. We are, as a House, about to be prorogued and rendered entirely ineffective until 14 October. This is the choice of the Government. The routes I might have wished to have taken to see this matter properly investigated simply do not match the time available for us to take them. As trust has progressively broken down, I am afraid I have become increasingly concerned that if one were simply to ask polite questions, the Government may not respond in the manner they should.