Labour should make standards in public life an issue at next election – Bryant

The Commons Standards Committee chair said discipline should be taken out of the hands of party whips and given to an independent body.

Sir Chris Bryant suggested that discipline should given exclusively to Parliament’s Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme (UK Parliament/Andy Bailey/PA) (PA Media)

Labour should make standards in public life an issue at the next election, a senior MP has said.

Speaking on the day Boris Johnson was found to have deliberately misled Parliament during the Partygate scandal, Commons Standards Committee chair Sir Chris Bryant suggested standards had deteriorated and would be an electoral issue.

He said: “You could say that there is nothing new under the sun, but I’m not so sure. I suspect we have a rum lot in this Parliament.”

I think that this will be an issue in the general election, it will be, and Labour should make it one to be honest

Sir Chris Bryant

He added: “But I think the big thing that is different in this Parliament is what I call the Mogg tendency. That’s the ‘Oh really, does this matter? The people in the Dog and Duck, they’re not talking about this stuff’, and I think that that is profoundly dangerous because it’s effectively a free pass for bad behaviour.”

Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, a strong ally of Mr Johnson, is one of a number of Conservative MPs who have criticised the findings of the Privileges Committee investigation into the former prime minister.

Sir Chris made his comments at a conference organised by Queen Mary University’s Mile End Institute on Thursday.

He added: “I would add Suella Braverman and Rishi Sunak to this list, it’s fairly consistent, I think, now and they just get away with it – and they’ve got a system for correcting the record which has been in place since 2007.

Labour’s got to come up with a set of proposals on how we are going to improve things. I know that Keir (Starmer) is very focused on that

Sir Chris Bryant

“So I’m worried about that, but I also think that this will be an issue in the general election, it will be, and Labour should make it one to be honest.

“That means Labour’s got to come up with a set of proposals on how we are going to improve things. I know that Keir (Starmer) is very focused on that.”

Both Mr Sunak and Ms Braverman have been accused of using incorrect statistics in Parliament in recent weeks. Mr Sunak had to correct the parliamentary record in May after claiming there were “record numbers” of people in work, while Ms Braverman was accused of incorrectly claiming the asylum backlog had decreased while making a statement to the Commons on June 5.

Sir Chris also suggested that discipline should be taken out of the hands of party whips and given exclusively to Parliament’s Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme.

(Today) is a good day for Parliament because a committee of Parliament has shown that it cannot be cowed, it can be effective, and I believe the Privileges Committee has reached the right conclusion

Lord Butler

He said: “It would mean that it would be kept confidential, which is better for both sides of the argument, for the complainant and the respondent, and it means that nobody’s just trying to protect the party.”

Former cabinet secretary Lord Butler also spoke at Thursday’s event, saying the Privileges Committee’s report was “a good day for Parliament”.

He said: “My remedy is the old-fashioned one. It’s the ‘good chaps’ principle, and if ever there was an example of it, we see it today.

“I think a lot of the low standards which we have seen in the last few years have come from the top of Government and the top of Government has shown it has not stood up for high standards.

“But today, I think, is a good day. It is a good day for Parliament because a committee of Parliament has shown that it cannot be cowed, it can be effective, and I believe the Privileges Committee has reached the right conclusion.”