Access to Parliament: Lure of the Palace of Westminster

THE HOUSE is in uproar as a scandal breaks. A Labour MP demands an investigation, claiming researchers' passes are being "handed around the Commons like confetti". The chairman of the Conservatives' influential Constitutional Committee says every pass must be examined.

That was 10 years ago after a Sunday newspaper reported that Pamella Bordes, a House of Commons passholder, was a prostitute who had a division bell fitted in her Westminster flat. Ms Bordes, who had been seen about town with the then editor of the Sunday Times, Andrew Neill, and with the Sports minister, Colin Moynihan, was said to have links with a Libyan spy.

And this is now. There are no known call girls on the current register of MPs' researchers but the list reveals the casual manner in which the passes are still allocated.

About half the 1,300 people listed as holding passes as MPs' researchers or secretaries are not in the House of Commons telephone book. More than 60 bear the same surname as the MPs with which their names are linked, suggesting that a host of sons and daughters have privileged access to Parliament.

Others include former MPs who simply like to keep up with old friends, academics who enjoy being able to access books and documents in the House and even, inexplicably, the social secretary to the High Commissioner for Pakistan.

There is another class of passholder for whom the Palace of Westminster is bread and butter. These are lobbyists, parliamentary officers of trade organisations, trades union officials, and national organisers of pressure groups and charities.

About 250 passholders declare outside interests for which access to the Palace of Westminster could prove useful. An unknown number have outside interests but do not declare them.

Among them is James Keight, leader of Knowsley Council, who told The Independent he had no idea he was meant to mention the position when he applied for a pass as assistant to his local Labour MP, Eddie O'Hara.

"In that case we will have to do it," he said when he was told of the rules. "I wasn't aware at all, and it must have been a complete oversight on my part. I work closely with Eddie and this pass is mainly so I can get into Parliament to see him quickly."

When researchers and secretaries apply for a Commons pass, they must fill in an eight-page registration form for members' staff. The first question on the form is: "Have you any relevant gainful occupation other than that in respect of which you are applying for a pass?"