You have to have to be quite brave these days to argue that there should be fewer investigations into sleazy MPs, but Michael Martin has had a go. The former Speaker took part in a debate in the House of Lords yesterday and he said that the parliamentary commissioner for standards ought to be banned from looking into misconduct allegations going back more than five years.
Under the current rules, the commissioner will normally refuse to consider a complaint if it relates to alleged misconduct that is more than seven years old. There have been exceptions, but only relating to allegations that are particularly serious. Lord Martin told the Lords that this was unfair and that there ought to be a five-year limit, at most.
One more thing has come to mind; the Americans call it the statute of limitations. There is a ruling that parliamentary commissioners do not go back more than so many years. There is some logic to that, because you cannot have a sword of Damocles hanging over someone for 15 or 16 years. However, a case has been looked at by the Commons parliamentary commissioner that went beyond seven years. That is unfair. The matter should have been dealt with at least within five years.
Peers were debating a proposal (which was passed) to appoint their own Lords commissioner for standards. Martin told them that although the idea of having "an all-singing, all-dancing parliamentary commissioner" sounded attractive, they might think differently once the first sleaze inquiries started getting under way.
