Early evening summary
- Stephen Barclay, the Cabinet Office minister, has expressed regret and admitted it was a mistake to try to spare a Tory MP from suspension by ripping up the standards system in a move that sparked a huge backlash from colleagues and the public. He was speaking at the start of a three-hour emergency debate on sleaze and corruption in parliament in which Keir Starmer accused Boris Johnson of giving “the green light to corruption”. (See 4.44m.) Opposition MPs, and even a former Tory chief whip, also criticised Johnson for not being in the Commons himself for the debate; he had an engagement in Northumberland, and No 10 said he could not get back in time because he was travelling by train. Johnson did give a media interview during his visit, but in it he refused point blank to apologise for the Paterson vote last week - even in the mild terms (“regret”, not “apologise”) used by Barclay. (See 1.36pm.)
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Kevin Brennan (Lab) intervenes on a point of order to say Boris Johnson arrived back in London from the north-east at 5pm. He suggests Johnson should come to the Commons now to apologise.
In the debate Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader at Westminster, says she and Adam Price, the party leader, are also writing to the Met police asking for an investigation into whether the Tories have broken the law banning the sale of honours.
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Former Tory chief whip Mark Harper says Johnson should apologise in person for Paterson vote
Mark Harper, the Conservative former chief whip, says that the report into Owen Paterson was clear and unambiguous, and that he thinks the government should schedule a vote of the kind proposed by Chris Bryant. (See 5.54pm.)
He says last week’s vote should not have been whipped.
Politics is a team game, he says. He says if the team captain expects loyalty, the decisions they take should be sound one. And if the captain gets it wrong, should apologise. That would demonstrate leadership, he says.
Harper says Stephen Barclay’s apology (see 3.30pm) was welcome, but his comments made it clear he thinks Boris Johnson should have apologised in person himself.
Mark Fletcher (Con), another member of the standards committee, says he thinks Owen Paterson would have been found to have broken the rules whatever the process set up.
All the points raised by Paterson and his allies were considered by the committee, he says.
Jess Phillips (Lab) says she tells her children, when they have to apologise, that sorry is just a word. She says the real test of an apology is whether it leads to a change in behaviour.
And on the issue of the Randox contracts (see 5.03pm), she says she was amazed how easily it was for firms to win contacts during Covid which had not gone out for tender. She says she is speaking as someone who has had to fill in detailed tender process documents, for sums as small as £25,000.
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Andy Carter, a Conservative member of the standards committee, told MPs in his speech that the committee could reject the findings of the parliamentary commissioner for standards, because that is what happened in the last inquiry into Boris Johnson.
He also said the statements from the 17 witnesses offered by Owen Paterson were read and considered carefully.
One of the main arguments from Paterson and his allies was that, because the 17 witnesses did not testify in person, their evidence had not been taken seriously.
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Bryant says there is a need to “tidy up what happened last week”.
He says ministers should disband the committee it was going to set up. And, even though Owen Paterson has left the Commons, he says the vote last week left the report into him “hanging in the air”.
He reads out the wording for a motion that he would like the Commons to vote on. It would rescind the vote last week, approve the standards committee report, and note that Paterson has been disqualified as an MP.
Bob Seely (Con) asks if Bryant thinks the system is fine as it is, or if he thinks it could be improved.
Bryant says he thinks Owen Paterson was given a very fair hearing.
He says the committee is reviewing the code of conduct. It is meant to do this every parliament, but did not after 2015 and 2017 because they kept holding elections.
He says he thinks there is a case for allowing an appeal against the sanction proposed.
Craig Mackinlay (Con) asks Bryant to accept that there is a big difference between suspending an MP for 11 days (which could trigger a recall election) and a suspension for nine days (which doesn’t).
Bryant accepts the point. But he says sanctions are based on precedent, and if he suggests that if the appeal body considered precedent too, it would probably propose a similar sanction.
Bryant says it is claimed there is no right of appeal in the system. But there is, he says. MPs appeal to the committee, which considers whether or not the report from the parliamentary commissioner for standards is right.
Sir Bill Cash (Con) says in the Owen Paterson case an investigatory panel should have been set up to resolve the facts. This is a process allowed under the rules (but normally not used).
Bryant says those panels are only meant to be used when there are disputed facts. But in this case there were no disputed facts, he says.
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Chris Bryant, the Labour chair of the standards committee, is speaking now.
He says Alberto Costa has often raised process issues in the committee. But often the legal advice given to the committee very strongly disagreed with what he was saying.
He says some argue that voters do not care about standards. But even if people don’t care, MPs should, he says.
He says in the past MPs have tried to lobby him, as committee chair, over cases. That is wrong, he says.
He says the committee is not meant to be a court of law. If it were, MPs would need legal representation. And some of the matters it deals with are too trivial for judges.
Alberto Costa (Con), a member of the standards committee, is giving his speech now, and he says the current system is flawed.
He says none of the members of the committee are required to have legal training.
And he says there is a conflict of interest. The committee has to consider reports from the parliamentary commissioner for standards, and to consider whether to accept or reject them. But the commissioner is also the principle adviser to the committee, he says.
He says judges should be involved.
And he says the committee, with 14 members, is too large to deal with disciplinary cases.
And he says the new system should include a version of the independent expert panel, the new body recently set up to consider appeals and deal with sanctions in the case of MPs accused of bullying or sexual harassment.
(These cases used to be heard by the standards committee, but in the light of MeToo, it was decided that it was wrong for MPs to sit in judgment on these allegations.)
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Here is Pete Wishart’s letter to the Met.
The SNP’s @PeteWishart has now formally reported Tories to Met Police over allegations they awarded peerages to donors who gave millions to the party.
— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) November 8, 2021
The SNP, of course, was behind the original complaints to the Met in the cash for peerages row that rocked Tony Blair’s govt. pic.twitter.com/U7egStveAc
SNP's Pete Wishart says he has asked Met police to investigate if Tories have broken law banning sale of honours
Pete Wishart, the SNP spokesman on House of Commons matters, has just told MPs that he has asked the Metropolitan police to investigate whether the Conservative party has broken the 1925 law banning the sale of honours. He says he was prompted by the revelations at the weekend.
That is the law under which Tony Blair’s government was investigated by the Met for allegedly selling honours. The inquiry led to Lord Levy, Blair’s chief fundraiser, being arrested, but in the end no one was ever charged, and many people took the view that the Met had over-reached itself.
Sir Peter Bottomley, the Conservative father of the Commons (longest-serving MP), told the chamber in the debate that he thought the current rules could and should be made to work.
Stamer's speech - snap verdict
In his party conference speech in September Keir Starmer described Boris Johnson as not a “bad man”, but a “trivial man”. It was an interesting line of attack, counter to the moral condemnation more normally directed at Johnson at Labour conference, but perhaps more persuasive to floating voters.
Starmer returned to his line in his peroration, when he said Johnson was “not a serious leader”. (See 5.06pm.) But the rest of the speech (see 4.44pm) implied that Starmer has revised his thinking quite a lot in the past few weeks; it was as if he was saying Johnson is quite a bad man after all.
It was a powerful and effective speech, clear and rigorous, and it is not hard to see why Johnson decided he would rather be elsewhere.
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And here is Starmer’s peroration.
Last week the prime minister damaged himself, he damaged his party and he damaged our democracy.
He led his party through the sewers and the stench lingers.
This week he had the chance to clean up, apologise to the country and finally accept the rules apply to him and his friends.
But instead of stepping up he has hidden away. Instead of clearing his mess he has left his side knee deep in it. Instead of leading from the front he has cowered away. He is not a serious leader and the joke isn’t funny anymore.
Labour calls for inquiry into whether lobbying by Paterson helped Randox get Covid contracts
Starmer says the government should start with three commitments.
Firstly, work with us to ensure [Rob Roberts, MP for Delyn] faces a recall petition. It is completely unacceptable for a member to be found guilty of sexually harassing junior staff yet avoid the judgment of the electorate on the basis of a loophole. The government has hidden behind that loophole. It’s time to come out of hiding.
Secondly, the prime minister needs to agree that no member found guilty of egregious breaches of the MPs’ code of conduct can be recommended for a peerage. The government can’t reward bad behaviour and corruption with a job for life making the laws of the land.
Finally, the prime minister must commit to a full and transparent investigation into Randox and government contracts.
We know that Randox has been awarded government contracts worth over £600m without competition or tender. We know that [Owen Paterson] lobbied for Randox. We know that he sat in on a call between Randox and the minister responsible for handling health contracts.
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Starmer says the government keeps trying to weaken the standards system, so its own behaviour is not criticised. But it should change its behaviour instead, he says.
He says the PM should have been here himself.
Leadership is about taking responsibility. And if there’s an apology to be made, that apology should come from the top, just as the direction came from the top last week to engage in this business in the first place.
Aaron Bell was the Conservative MP who said earlier that he had never been threatened with the loss of cash to his constituency for rebelling. (See 4.33pm.) He told Wendy Chamberlain during her speech:
I would just like to make it clear that at no stage were any threats of that nature made to me when I broke the whip last week.
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Starmer cites the recent revelations about how being Conservative party treasurer and donating £3m to the party seems to guarantee a peerage. There is no doubt the Lords needs fundamental reform, he says.
Starmer says Labour will oppose changes to rules that would 'weaken standards' for MPs
Starmer says Labour is willing to work with the government on some things.
But it will not work with them “on their plans to weaken standards”.
Starmer says Paterson was used by PM as 'pawn' in attack on parliamentary commissioner for standards
Starmer says it is time to draw a line in the sand, and say enough is enough.
The case against Owen Paterson was simple, he says.
All MPs have considerable sympathy with Paterson because of what happened to his wife, he says.
Paterson was treated fairly, he says.
The PM should have told Paterson to accept that what he did was wrong.
But instead the public were let down, and Paterson himself. He was use “as a pawn in an extraordinary attack on our commissioner for standards”. Starmer goes on:
Threats to have money taken away from schools, hospitals and high streets unless members voted to undermine the commissioner.
Ministers sent out on the airwaves the morning after the vote, to call for her to reconsider and consider her position.
And a sham committee proposed so the government can set the judge and jury for future cases.
This was a deliberate course of action.
But the government was caught off guard by the public outcry, and they’ve climbed down.
Mr Speaker, this wasn’t a tactical mistake ... It was the prime minister’s way of doing business, a pattern of behaviour.
Starmer says Johnson has given 'green light to corruption'
Keir Starmer starts his speech reminding MPs that he used to face Barclay often when they both had the Brexit portfolio.
He says Boris Johnson damaged himself and his party last week.
He says democracy requires voters to trust politicians. He goes on:
But when the prime minister gets the green light to corruption, he corrodes that trust.
When he says that the rules to stop vested interest don’t apply to his friends, he corrodes that trust.
And when he deliberately undermines those charged with stopping corruption, he corrodes that trust, and that is exactly what the prime minister did last week.
Clive Efford (Lab) asks if the government now accepts Owen Paterson behaved badly.
Barclay says Paterson has resigned, and therefore suspending him would no longer be appropriate.
He ends his speech by saying the government will be listening carefully to what MPs say.
Simon Hoare (Con) asks what the status of the motion passed last week is. And which committee will review procedures? Will it be the one set up last week?
Barclay says the committee agreed last week will not be able to develop proposals without cross-party support. He says the government will continue discussions across the house.
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Barclay appears to rule out allowing MPs new vote to endorse report condemning Paterson
Chris Bryant, the Labour chair of the standards committee, asks if the government will table a motion for debate tomorrow to clear things up effectively rescinding last week’s vote, and endorsing the standards committee report.
Barclay says he will listen to the house. But he says Paterson has resigned, and he says Paterson has suffered a serious personal tragedy.
He says the government wants to take things forward on a cross-party basis.
Peter Kyle (Lab) says Barclay should apologise to constituents living in constituencies where ministers threatened to withdraw funding if the local Tory MP rebelled.
Barclay refers Kyle to a Tory MP who intervened earlier who said he received no such threat, despite being a rebel on this.
UPDATE: The MP was Aaron Bell. See 4.56pm.
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Barclay expresses 'regret' on behalf of the government for Paterson vote
Barclay says he wants to express his regret for the “mistake” made by the government last week, when it linked the Owen Paterson case to the issue of wider reform in general.
Stephen Barclay, the Cabinet Office minister, rises to open for the government.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, says Boris Johnson, and the SNP leader at Westminster, Ian Blackford, both called him earlier to explain why they would not be there. Johnson was visiting a hospital, and Blackford was at Cop26.
Hoyle says MPs can make their own minds up about these reasons. But he says he does not want to hear people bringing this up all through the debate.
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Chamberlain says she wants to know why the Cabinet Office minister, Stephen Barclay, is replying to this debate. What does the Cabinet Office have to do with this? She says the leader of the Commons should be replying.
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Chamberlain says she finds it hard to believe that Owen Paterson was able to vote on his own case last week.
And the votes of MPs currently under investigation were critical, she says.
She says changing this must be a priority.
Chamerblain says during the Covid pandemic her constituents have had to follow more rules than ever before.
But we are ruled by ministers who seem to care less about the rules than any of the predecessors in living memory, she says.
She says we need a public inquiry into this. The PM won’t even turn to the debate, she says. She says that is a pity because there is a lot that we do not know about his role.
She says the PM has been investigated more than any other MP in recent years. So who stood to benefit from the system being undermined? She says people will draw their own conclusions.
She also says the minister, in his reply, needs to specifically address claims that Tory MPs were told their constituencies would lose funding if they did not support the government.
Wendy Chamberlain, the Lib Dem chief whip, is opening the debate. That is because this is not a normal debate – opened by a minister one, if it is a government one, or Labour, if it is an opposition day one – but an emergency debate under standing order 24. And Chamberlain applied for this on behalf of the Lib Dems.
Chamberlain says she is horrified at the threats being directed at the parliamentary commissioner for standards.
I was horrified to learn that the commissioner for standards has received death threats, that is appalling.
No one should receive death threats for doing their job. The role of commissioner for standards was one of the key ways that we moved beyond previous scandals.
The role is not political, the commissioner was appointed by this House to do a job and that is what she has done and continues to do.
The actions of the government last week have tarnished this house’s reputation.
Labour’s Tan Dhesi intervenes, describing Boris Johnson as a “tin pot dictator” who is “mired in sleaze”.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, objects. His appeal for MPs to avoid party-political sniping (see 4.11pm) is being ignored already.
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Speaker urges MPs to 'tone down party-political sniping'
Hoyle says he granted today’s debate because he thought it was the best way to sort out the mess they were in.
I granted this debate today because I thought it was essential to sort out the mess we’re in.
We can start to do that today but it requires two things for us all – to tone down the party political sniping and focus calmly on making sure the system is as effective as it can be, and for everyone to recognise if we’re going to achieve progress we’ll only do so on a cross-party basis.
And he says MPs should not make allegations of impropriety against each other unless they are doing so on a substantive motion.
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Hoyle says MPs should not criticise parliamentary commissioner for standards
Hoyle says MPs should not criticise Kathryn Stone, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, “that we have appointed”.
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Hoyle says he is required to maintain strict neutrality.
That means allowing amendments that have significant support, whatever he thinks about them.
He says Owen Paterson has resigned as an MP.
But he says the house has not reached a decision on the standards committee report into Paterson.
A new standards committee report on the standards system is due soon.
He says, if the Commons wants to review the system, opposition parties must participate.
That means the committee MPs voted to set up last week, chaired by John Whittingdale, cannot operate.
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Speaker's statement ahead of sleaze/corruption debate
Sir Lindsay Hoyle is now making a short statement ahead of the sleaze debate.
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Yesterday the Sunday Times reported that Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Commons Speaker, was expected to announce today plans for an independent review of the Commons standards regime. It was a surprising claim, given that the Commons standards committee is close to publishing its own report on this very topic, which MPs are expected to debate in the new year. But the Speaker’s office did not deny the story, which suggests it was well founded.
Now, according to Tom Newton Dunn of Times Radio, if Hoyle was planning a review of his own, he has had second thoughts.
I understand the Speaker will tell the Commons later that he will not now set up his own special committee to review MPs' standards, but instead delegate what he intended to do to the House's Committee on Standards whose report will now widen to take in last week's controversies.
— Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) November 8, 2021
There have been 114 Covid cases in parliament in the last month, my colleague Aubrey Allegretti reports. That won’t just be among MPs. There are 650 MPs, but several thousand people working on the parliamentary estate.
NEW: Parliament has seen 114 Covid cases "with links to the estate" in last month, email sent out just now says.
— Aubrey Allegretti (@breeallegretti) November 8, 2021
"A review of measures on the estate will take place this week with any changes approved by the Commissions of both Houses."
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Germany would not let EU shelve its trade deal with UK, DUP leader suggests
Yesterday Simon Coveney, the Irish foreign minister, became the latest figure to suggest that, if the UK triggers article 16, suspending aspects of the Northern Ireland protocol, the EU could retaliate by suspending its entire free trade deal with the EU.
Today Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader, said that he did not think the EU would take such a step.
In comments reminiscent of Brexiter claims circa 2017 about the the likely influence of BMW manufacturers in the Brussels negotiations with the UK, Donaldson said:
The EU does a lot of trade with the United Kingdom.
Germany, the biggest trading nation in the EU, the United Kingdom is its biggest market in Europe, it’s the second biggest market for Germany in the whole world.
Does anyone seriously believe that the Germans want to open a trade war with the United Kingdom? That’s not the answer here.
The answer is to sit around the table and agree a solution. If the EU can’t do that, if the EU prefers instead to choose rhetoric, to choose a trade war over the need to protect the political process in Northern Ireland, then I’m sad about that.
But it means the UK government then must take decisive action to restore Northern Ireland’s place within the UK internal market and respect what the Belfast Agreement says - that Northern Ireland remains an integral part of the United Kingdom, unless the people of Northern Ireland decide otherwise.
But Colum Eastwood, the SDLP leader, said today he thought triggering article 16 could lead to the entire UK-EU trade deal, the trade and cooperation agreement, unravelling. He said:
If you’re the European Union or any country around the world and you enter into an agreement with another country, say for example the United Kingdom, if they continue to not live up to their responsibilities around a deal we have no trust, these trade agreements need trust to be at the heart of them.
What I’m really worried about is we have a reckless prime minister, we’ve Lord Frost who is absolutely ideological about this stuff, and they are not serious about doing a deal [on the protocol].
That means there’s no trust between the European Commission, European Union and the British government. How can we, on that footing, expect for things not to unravel further?
The best thing to do is for people to be serious about the issues, sit down and resolve them in an adult fashion. But this kind of megaphone diplomacy threatening to trigger article 16 - what does article 16 actually do? It has a further negotiation.
Why don’t we negotiate in the negotiation we’re in right now, that’s the best way to solve the problems.
Ipsos Mori has released its latest political monitor (pdf), with full details of the polling in the Evening Standard today. (See 11.14am.) Here are some of the key charts.
And here are some charts from Dylan Spielman, an Ipsos Mori researcher, based on the latest data.
NEW: The Conservatives are losing the highest proportion of their 2019 voters yet in the latest @IpsosMORI Political Monitor - and the highest proportion directly to Labour (9%) pic.twitter.com/SJg63mf8Cm
— Dylan Spielman (@DylanSpielman) November 8, 2021
Labour under Starmer is now doing better than an average UK opposition party - from historic trends Labour should continue to improve their position at this point before falling back pic.twitter.com/tvXFS3xfVi
— Dylan Spielman (@DylanSpielman) November 8, 2021
Compared to other oppositions, Starmer's Labour is now roughly doing as well as Kinnock in 1987-92, only behind Kinnock 1983-78 and Blair 1992-97 pic.twitter.com/tefIa3qZQT
— Dylan Spielman (@DylanSpielman) November 8, 2021
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George Freeman, the science minister, has had a bad case of Covid, he says on Twitter.
🚨Sorry to report I’ve had a bad attack of Covid🦠 over last 3 days w difficulty breathing on Fri/Sat (thanks🙏 to @EastEnglandAmb team for your help).
— George Freeman MP (@GeorgeFreemanMP) November 8, 2021
Confined on DR’s orders to bed for another few days & then quarantine til next Monday, when I hope to be back fighting fit.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Commons Speaker, has told Sky News that he hopes today’s debate will allow the Commons to move forward. He said:
I don’t want another week like [last week], we’ve got to move forward,
This house matters to me, the MPs matter, the people who work here matter to me, and what I don’t want is another dark week like last week.
I want to make sure the public have faith in parliamentarians and faith in the House of Commons, and today’s debate will be painful, but the one thing is, it’s got to cleanse the house to move forward.
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Starmer accuses Johnson of 'running scared' from debate on sleaze
This is from Keir Starmer on Boris Johnson’s failure to apologise for his handling of the Owen Paterson vote last week. (See 12.59pm.)
Boris Johnson does not have the decency either to defend or apologise for his actions. Rather than repairing the damage he has done, the prime minister is running scared. When required to lead, he has chosen to hide. His concern, as always, is self-preservation not the national interest.
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Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, and Lord Bethell, the Conservative former health minister, have been arguing on Twitter about what she has said about his involvement in the awarding of Covid contracts. Here are the highlights.
Randox paid Owen Paterson £100,000/yr to lobby for them. Owen Paterson sat in on a call between Randox and @JimBethell, who dished out Covid contracts.
— Angela Rayner (@AngelaRayner) November 8, 2021
Randox was awarded over £500m in Covid contracts without a tender or an open process. Let's call this what it is - corruption.
I thought that we all have a responsibility for our language and rhetoric, and should avoid toxifying the national debate?
— Lord Bethell (@JimBethell) November 8, 2021
This sort of consistent personal attack unfairly implies wrongdoing. It sneers at our national effort, when in fact so many were seeking to save lives. https://t.co/71K279aazp
Calling corruption corruption is not "toxifying the national debate", it is a statement of fact.
— Angela Rayner (@AngelaRayner) November 8, 2021
Publish your private WhatsApps and emails detailing how Randox were awarded over £500m without tender, despite not having enough equipment and failing to deliver a previous contract. https://t.co/JScq9MG0Vs
I published my full witness statement - showing my 100% commitment to complying with proceedings - to give context to these selectively shared excerpts from legal proceedings. I recommend all those interested please read it here 👇. https://t.co/yoeprHafDS https://t.co/YToIxKfUpT
— Lord Bethell (@JimBethell) November 8, 2021
Jim can you confirm that you had a meeting with Randox and Owen Paterson? Can you confirm that Randox was awarded over £500m in contracts without tender? Can you confirm that you discussed the awarding of contracts on WhatsApp and then deleted your WhatsApps? Best wishes, Angela
— Angela Rayner (@AngelaRayner) November 8, 2021
A Scottish anti-independence campaign group was given £46,000 from an obscure organisation that might have breached political fundraising guidelines, my colleagues Niamh McIntyre and Severin Carrell report.
Summary of Downing Street lobby briefing
Turning back to the No 10 lobby briefing, here is a full summary of what was said.
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The prime minister’s spokesman said Boris Johnson could not attend today’s Commons debate covering sleaze/corruption allegations because he had a “long-standing” diary commitment to be in Northumberland. The appointment was scheduled before it was known the debate was taking place today, the spokesman said. No 10 signalled that Johnson would not be able to be able to return to London in time for the debate because the rail timetable did not allow this. When it was pointed out that Johnson took a private jet last week to return to London from Glasgow for a reunion dinner with his former Daily Telegraph colleagues, the spokesman said he had given reasons for that flight last week. (The spokesman mentioned “security and time restraints” as factors last week.) When it was put to him that if Johnson really wanted to attend the debate, of course he could arrange to be there, the spokesman said:
All I’m saying is ... we think the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster [Stephen Barclay], whose department has the lead in this area, is the right person to lead.
The spokesman also indicated that Johnson’s travel plans meant he was unlikely to be watching the debate live on the TV in his office, as Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggested this morning he would be. (See 9.07am.) When it was put to him that, by travelling to the other end of England and not even watching the debate, Johnson was doing his best to ignore it, the spokesman said: “No, I wouldn’t accept that.”
- No 10 refused to back the claim by George Eustice, the environment secretary yesterday, that the row over the Paterson vote was a “storm in a teacup”. Asked about this, the spokesman said:
We fully recognise the strong feeling on all sides of the House on this.
- The spokesman seemed to rule out the government putting forward its own plans to reform the standards regime now, saying it wanted reform to go ahead on a cross-party basis.
- The spokesman suggested that the parliamentary commissioner for standards would have no right to investigate the refurbishment of the PM’s Downing Street flat. Financial support with this was declared in the ministerial register. The spokesman said interests declared in the ministerial register did not need to be “double declared” in the MPs’s register too. He said this was clearly a ministerial matter, “as the PM only occupies [the flat] by virtue of his office”.
- The spokesman refused to say what the PM would do if the parliamentary commissioner for standards did order him to declare the flat refurbishment in the MPs’ register. That was a “large hypothetical situation which I’m not going to comment on”, the spokesman said.
- The spokesman did not rule out Johnson returning to Glasgow for the end of the Cop26 conference at the end of this week.
Johnson says he hopes Speaker will launch move to get cross-party agreement on reform of standards system
And here are full quotes from Boris Johnson’s comments to the media in Northumberland.
- Johnson refused to apologise for his handling of the Owen Paterson vote last week. The first time he was asked if he would apologise, he ignored the question completely. When he was asked again, he said:
What we’ve got to make sure is that we take all this very, very seriously and that we get it right. And there’s a debate today - unfortunately I can’t be there because I have a long-standing engagement up here - but Labour want to focus on a particular case, a particular MP who suffered a serious personal tragedy and who’s now resigning ...
Frankly, I don’t think there’s much more to be said about that particular case, I really don’t.
But what we do need to do is look also at the process that is. That is what we were trying to do last week.
- He said he hoped the Speaker would launch an attempt to reach cross-party agreement on a way forward, “including an appeals process for very difficult and very sad cases, such as the one we’ve seen”.
- He said he did not accept the charge that, having been in office for more than two years, he only took an interest in changing the system when one of his MPs was under threat.
- He refused to say whether or not he favoured banning MPs from doing consultancy work. Asked about this proposal, he said: “All those kind of things are issues that the Speaker’s panel - whatever he is going to set up - will have a look at.”
- He denied being someone who thought the rules did not apply to him. Asked if he thought that, he replied: “No, of course not.”
- He said there has been no discussion of giving Paterson a peerage - but he would not rule out the prospect. (See 1.04pm.)
- Johnson refused to answer a question about why, over the past seven years, almost every Conservative party treasurer has been given a peerage. In response, he said wanted to focus on booster vaccines.
- He said booster jabs were necessary because “sadly” the effectiveness of vaccines does wane. He said he was encouraging people to book a booster, taking advantage of the rule change coming into force today allowing people to make the booking for a booster a month before they are actually eligible for it.
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Johnson refuses to rule out giving Owen Paterson peerage, just saying it hasn't been discussed
The final question in the interview was about the prospect of Owen Paterson getting a peerage.
Q: Can you rule out Owen Paterson getting a peerage?
Johnson said: “There’s been absolutely no discussion of that.”
That is a less categorical denial than government sources were giving yesterday on Johnson’s behalf.
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Johnson refuses to apologise for getting Tory MPs to vote to protect Paterson last week
Sky News is broadcasting the interview Boris Johnson has given at a hospital in Northumberland.
He starts by speaking about the booster jab programme. He is encouraging people to get one.
Q: Will you apologise for what happened with the Owen Paterson vote last week?
Johnson says there is a debate today. He cannot be there because he has a longstanding engagement.
He says Paterson suffered a serious personal tragedy (the death of his wife by suicide last year). He says he does not think there is more to say about the case.
He says he thinks the Speaker wants to have a cross-party look at how they can look at the case for appeals in difficult case.
Q: So you are not going to apologise?
Johnson says he wants to get this right. The government is focused on getting this right, he says.
Q: How do you respond to John Major who said your handling of this case was shameful. Do the rules not not apply to you?
Johnson says of course not. There is no more to say about the Paterson case, he says.
Q: Over the past few years every Conservative treasurer has been given a peerage. How do you explain that?
Johnson says he want to focus on booster vaccines.
Updated
It has also been announced that Sajid Javid, the health secretary, will make a Commons statement on the David Fuller necrophilia case at 3.30pm. That means the debate on sleaze/standards/corruption will not start until around 4.30pm.
The Speaker’s office has confirmed that Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, will make a statement ahead of the debate starting in the Commons this afternoon. Hoyle said:
Last week did not show our democracy in the best light. I hope today’s debate will give members the chance to express their views and help us move forward. I also hope MPs will consider their language to get the right message across.
Barack Obama, the former US president, has arrived at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow.
There is more coverage on our Cop26 live blog.
No 10 says PM unable to attend sleaze debate because he's returning from north-east visit by train
The Downing Street lobby briefing is over, and the prime minister’s spokesman has confirmed that Boris Johnson will not be speaking in, or attending, the sleaze/standards/corruption debate in the Commons this afternoon.
And he won’t be watching it on the TV in his office afterwards; he is on a visit to a hospital in the north-east. No 10 signalled that he would not be able to be able to return to London in time for the debate because the rail timetable did not allow this.
When journalists pointed out that last week Johnson took a private jet so that he could return from the Cop26 conference in Glasgow for a private reunion dinner with former Daily Telegraph leader writers, the spokesman claimed that that was different and that last week other factors applied.
It is all slightly reminiscent of when Johnson, as foreign secretary, flew off to Afghanistan so that he could conveniently miss a Commons vote on the Heathrow third runway which the government was implementing but which he had always vowed to oppose.
In a further effort to downgrade the significance of the debate, No 10 announced that Stephen Barclay, the Cabinet Office minister, will be responding from the government. Yesterday government sources indicated it would be Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, and this morning Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the international trade secretary, also said she expected Rees-Mogg to be putting the government’s case in the debate.
It is not hard to see the rationale for this. Rees-Mogg is constantly provocative, and his performance in the debate last week angered many Tories, as well as the opposition. By contrast, Barclay is the news equivalent of a fire blanket; he could make an announcement about the end of the world sound dull. If No 10 want to push the debate down the news agenda for tonight’s TV bulletins, Barclay’s the man for the job.
I will post a full summary of the lobby briefing shortly.
Updated
Here are two polling experts on the latest polling figures from Ipsos Mori. (See 11.14am.)
NEW: @IpsosMORI polling for @Evening Standard:
— Kelly Beaver (@KellyIpsosMORI) November 8, 2021
Labour: 36% (n/c)
Conservatives: 35% (-4)
Greens: 11% (+5)
Lib Dems: 9% (n/c)
Other: 9% (n/c)
(Fieldwork: 29 Oct – 4 Nov 2021) pic.twitter.com/DhHRiQVahC
These are from Matt Singh, founder of Number Cruncher Politics.
Cold take: Those Ipsos MORI numbers aren't much different to other polls done at the same time (either in levels or changes). What we haven't yet had very much of is polling done completely post-Paterson
— Matt Singh (@MattSingh_) November 8, 2021
(Whether it's an MoE Lab lead or MoE Con lead probably matters a great deal for internal party politics in both parties than it does to everyone else)
— Matt Singh (@MattSingh_) November 8, 2021
MoE is margin of error.
Green share of 11% is one of their best ever outside of a Euro elections period. Still unclear what happens after #COP26, but a strong number
— Matt Singh (@MattSingh_) November 8, 2021
And these are from Rob Ford, a politics professor at Manchester University
The general trend in the polls is quite clear if you take the averages (thus ignoring the noise from sampling variation and ST effects) - slow but steady decline in Cons since "vaccine bounce" peak in early summer, and slow but steady rises in Lab and Green numbers https://t.co/jXD3TUBJAB
— Rob Ford (@robfordmancs) November 8, 2021
Strong Green polling is a bit of a double edged sword for Labour - probably comes from voters who would be Lab rather than Con if forced to choose, so weakens Lab position. But in the harsh climate of a FPP GE with few Grn targets many of these votes may end up in the Lab column
— Rob Ford (@robfordmancs) November 8, 2021
Updated
The Commons home affairs committee has published a report today approving the appointment of Julia Mulligan as the next chair of the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority.
The Progressive Unionist party, which is politically aligned to the paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force, has declared there is “no basis” for unionists to continue to support Northern Ireland’s Good Friday peace agreement.
The PUP leader, Billy Hutchinson, who was one of the negotiators central to the 1998 peace accord, described the historic deal as containing a “deceptive snare” in a six-page statement on Monday.
He said the peace process flowing from the agreement had not faithfully observed the text of the accord and had instead led to an incremental weakening of the union by delivering repeated concessions to nationalists.
But he pledged to “continue to work constructively with leaders of all other unionist parties” to “secure the removal of the intolerable and constitutionally damaging protocol”.
He also called for the Northern Ireland Act to be strengthened to cement the country’s place in the United Kingdom. He said:
It is my view that if, as is currently the case, the constitutional guarantee is not as was promised to the unionist community, then there is no basis for unionist support for the Belfast agreement.
He insisted the PUP remained “firm and dedicated” supporters of peace in Northern Ireland.
His statement comes after a second bus was torched in a week in Northern Ireland in what police described as a “terrifying” attack for passengers ordered off the double decker on Sunday night.
Photograph: David Young/PA
Updated
New polling from Ipsos Mori suggests the Conservatives have lost their lead in the polls, the Evening Standard reports.
Westminster voting intention:
— Britain Elects (@BritainElects) November 8, 2021
LAB: 36% (-)
CON: 35% (-4)
GRN: 11% (+5)
LDEM: 9% (-)
via @IpsosMORI, 29 Oct - 04 Nov
Chgs. w/ Sephttps://t.co/uUEQTNgoGf
In his story on the findings, the Standard’s Nicholas Cecil says the poll figures also show that “for the first since [Boris] Johnson gained the keys to Downing Street, a majority of adults in Britain disagree that he has what it takes to be a good prime minister”. Cecil goes on:
Fifty-five per cent of adults disagree that Mr Johnson has what it take to be a good prime minister, with 34 per cent saying he does, giving him a net score of -21. This is a sharp drop from +2 in June, and the lowest score since June 2019, a month before he walked into No 10.
Forty-one per cent do not believe Sir Keir has what it takes to be a good prime minister, with 25 per cent thinking he does, a net score of -16, up from -24 in June.
Sixty-one per cent of people say they are dissatisfied with Mr Johnson, and 34 per satisfied, giving a net score of -27, a big drop from -12 in September. It also equals his lowest satisfaction rating as PM, which was last October.
Perhaps most worryingly of all for the PM, Cecil also reports that most of the fieldwork for this poll was conducted before the Owen Paterson vote debacle.
Updated
The Conservative MP Richard Graham has just told BBC News that he supports calls to change the rule that allows an MP facing a disciplinary sanction to take part in the Commons vote on whether or not that punishment should be enforced (as Owen Paterson did last week). Asked if this was right, Graham said it was an “odd” rule and he went on: “There are a number of things in the process that will need to be reviewed, and that’s certainly one of them.”
This is an issue that has been highlighted in particular by the Lib Dems, who requested today’s emergency debate on standards. Wendy Chamberlain, the Lib Dem chief whip, said:
It beggars belief that Owen Paterson was able to vote on his own suspension ... It’s the equivalent of defendants in a court case also taking part in the jury.
Alberto Costa, a Conservative MP and a member of the Commons standards committee, told Sky News this morning that he favoured a change to the way complaints about MPs are investigated.
He said he did not think MPs should sit in judgment on their colleagues, as they do now. (That’s because the standards committee recommends what should happen if MPs have broken the rules, although now half of the committee’s members are non-MPs.) He said he thought judges should take the final decision. He told Sky News:
The problem lies with the Commons own rules and I’ve argued with Chris [Bryant, the standards committee chair] over many months that the rules need to change.
I don’t think MPs should be adjudicating on issues against other MPs. Let the commissioner present her face to judges and let them be the ultimate arbiters.
Up until recently, I was the only lawyer on that committee. The standards committee has to improve to ensure we have a much more transparent system where he adopts as much as possible to mirror a court of law. I think it’s high time Chris listens to me and we bring in judges as we have done as an independent expert panel.
Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, is set to meet army leaders to address culture concerns in the British military, PA Media reports. PA says:
Wallace told the BBC that the concerns include the sexual harassment of women in the British army.
It comes following a report into the bullying and sexual harassment of women in the armed forces led by Tory MP and former soldier Sarah Atherton.
Atherton’s report found that almost two thirds of women had experienced bullying, sexual harassment and discrimination while serving in the Army.
The report, made up of the findings of interviews with more than 4,000 servicewomen and female veterans, also included accounts of rape or sex for advancement.
Nearly 40% of 993 women asked reported that their experience of the complaints system was “extremely poor”.
Six out of 10 women said they had not reported bullying, harassment or discrimination due to a lack of faith in the system.
There are more than 20,000 women currently serving in the armed forces.
In a statement, the army said it was working with the defence secretary to “drive out unacceptable behaviour at all levels”.
“The secretary of state is determined to work with the army’s leadership to drive out unacceptable behaviour at all levels, particularly with respect to the treatment of women,” an army spokesperson said.
“The army’s core value of respect for others must underpin everything it delivers on behalf of the nation, whether in the United Kingdom or operating around the world.”
Trevelyan backs banning MPs from having political consultancy jobs
And here are some more lines on the topic of sleaze/standards from Anne-Marie Trevelyan’s interview round this morning interview round.
- Trevelyan, the international trade secretary, implied there was a case for banning MPs from having political consultancy jobs. This is significant because the cross-party standards committee is looking at this issue, and may well recommend such a ban within weeks. It was not clear to what extent Trevelyan was putting across a government view, and to what extent she was freelancing (just giving a personal opinon), but she made the point more than once, implying this was a message she wanted to convey. She told Sky News:
I think the question of whether MPs having jobs that involve lobbying, I think, perhaps should be looked at again.
MPs are already supposed to be banned from paid lobbying, but there is a loophole that allows lobbying if it will expose a “serious wrong” and MPs are allowed to give consultancy advice that helps companies with their own lobbying, as long as they do not actually pick up the phone themselves.
Later Trevelyan told Today:
We should never rule out completely second jobs [for MPs] ... The question is, are we looking at second jobs or specifically some types of consultancy. Personally, I think we should look at that. I’m very comfortable with looking at that.
- She said she did not think there was a wider problem with corruption in public life. She told BBC Breakfast:
The standards system that we have looks into individual situations where they come up, and those have been dealt with, and, indeed, the debate this afternoon will continue again. I don’t consider that there’s a need for an inquiry into something. Why? Because I don’t think there is a wider problem here.
Trevelyan was explaining why she did not back the Lib Dem call for a public inquiry into the recent sleaze and corruption allegations.
“I don’t consider that there is a need for an inquiry because I don’t believe there is a wider problem here”⁰
— BBC Breakfast (@BBCBreakfast) November 8, 2021
On #BBCBreakfast International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan responds to calls for an independent corruption inquiry. https://t.co/BUTH0eIz4q pic.twitter.com/pbsEt70Vxp
- She said she did not expect Owen Paterson to get a peerage.
Is Owen Paterson going to be made a lord?
— Times Radio (@TimesRadio) November 8, 2021
Anne Marie Trevelyan, international trade secretary, answered in one sentence.@ayeshahazarika | @StigAbell | @annietrev pic.twitter.com/41p7278JPa
This was the line coming out of No 10 yesterday, after the PM’s spokesperson refused to rule it out at a lobby briefing on Friday.
- She said she expected Kathryn Stone, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, to stay in her job. She said: “She will continue to do her job and I’m [in] no doubt she will.” Only last Thursday Trevelyan’s cabinet colleague Kwasi Kwarteng, the business secretary, was implying Stone should resign.
- Trevelyan said she herself has received death threats. She was responding to a question about how Stone herself has been given extra protection because of threats she has received.
- She defended the way key Conservative donors have been given peerages, saying people put in the House of Lords have “usually done enormously good work”. At the weekend research was published showing that Conservative party treasurers who give at least £3m to the party seem to be guaranteed a peerage. Trevelyan said all main parties have put business donors into the Lords. She said:
We have an incredible system in the UK where we don’t ask the state to fund the our political parties and if we didn’t have the private donations that come through from donors large and small - in my constituency, people donate 25 a year and donors who can provide more, do more - if we didn’t do that the taxpayer would be funding political activity.
I think our UK system is uniquely well-placed to ensure that we get this broad stretch ... the unions fund a great deal of the Labour Party’s activity, again that’s from many, many small voices, and then some large ones too.
It’s a mix which brings a real depth of voices to our political parties across the piste.
- She said she had only had a few emails from constituents about last week’s vote to shelve the proposal to suspend Paterson for breaking lobbying rules. She said:
My postbag mostly reflects people who are frustrated by local issues, questions of accessing vaccines, anxieties about those sorts of issues, and indeed, local questions about how they can make progress with housing in my patch.
So I’ve had a few emails with concerns about the way the debate went last week. I wasn’t there, so I wasn’t able to comment directly.
Updated
Cabinet minister says no need for PM to attend sleaze debate, but he is likely to watch on TV
Good morning. MPs will this afternoon hold a three-hour debate on sleaze, or rather on “the consequences of the decision of the house of 3 November relating to standards”, as the motion more coyly put it. Last night Labour announced that Keir Starmer would be leading for his party, and it challenged Boris Johnson to turn up to. “Boris Johnson needs to attend this debate, answer for his mistakes apologise to the country and take action to undo the damage he has done,” Starmer said, in a statement best described as an aspiration rather than an expectation. (Johnson is even more allergic to apologising than most politicians.) The Lib Dems, who called for today’s emergency debate, have also got their own improbable request; they want Johnson to launch a public inquiry into all the sleaze allegations dogging his government.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the international trade secretary, has been doing the morning interview round and, when she was asked on Sky News if Johnson would attend the debate, she said she did not know. (Yesterday government sources were saying Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, would speak for the government, but that was before Labour said they were putting up Starmer.) Asked if Johnson should be speaking, Trevelyan replied:
My opinion would be that no, he shouldn’t be there. He will no doubt, as we all do, have the House of Commons on in his office as he’s dealing with many, many other issues that only the prime minister can deal with. And he will get a briefing of the key issues raised by colleagues from across the house later.
Here is the agenda for the day.
11.30am: Downing Street holds its lobby briefing.
3.15pm: The IFS and the Resolution Foundation give evidence to the Commons Treasury committee about the budget.
After 3.30pm: MPs begin their emergency three-hour debate on Commons standards.
4pm: Michael Gove, the levelling up secretary, gives evidence to the Commons housing committee (it hasn’t changed its name yet to reflect the name change at Gove’s department).
Johnson is also on a visit this morning, and is expected to record a broadcast interview that will be out around lunchtime.
I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com
Updated
