Notification of Arrest of Members — House of Commons, 2016-02-10
Topic: Government Operations
Charles Ashley Rupert Walker (Conservative, Centre-right): In the previous Parliament, the Procedure Committee was asked to look into the existing protocols around the arrest of Members of Parliament. We started preliminary inquiries in early 2015, and this work laid the foundation for the inquiry we launched shortly after the general election The findings of the inquiry were unanimously endorsed by the Committee, which reported to the House in December. I know that our moderate and proportionate recommendations relating to the arrest of Members have created a great deal of faux sound and fury in various quarters. On Monday morning, I had to smile at the assertion by Kevin O’Sullivan, a Mirror journalist, on Sky Television, that "they should very much be named because everyone else is… that’s always been the system. Once you are arrested, you can be named". That was an enlightening observation for two reasons: first, because it was completely wrong, and secondly and more interestingly, because it gave a revealing insight into the conduct of too many national newsrooms and their own morality when it comes to obtaining information from public officials I accept that the media have a job to do, and that includes making our lives difficult, so my greatest disappointment in the reporting on the Committee’s proposals is reserved for Sir Alistair Graham, the former chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life. From his pejorative comments about our report, it is clear either that he has not read it or, if he has read it, that he has no appreciation of, or regard for, the law. I know that Sir Alistair’s time in the chair from 2004 to 2007 was not a happy one. During his three years in office, he felt deeply aggrieved that at no stage did the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, agree to his repeated requests for a meeting. I accept that the then PM was perhaps churlish in his refusal to meet him, but I gently ask Sir Alistair to pursue his grievance with the former Prime Minister, as opposed to taking his frustrations out on the House of Commons, which had no hand in his disappointment. On a personal note, it is sad to see a distinguished former public servant and knight of the realm allowing himself to be turned into little more than a misinformed talking head Let me be absolutely clear: the Procedure Committee is not asking for Members of Parliament to receive special treatment in the eyes of the law. Such a request, if made, would be alien to the values of our Committee and to the wishes of our constituents. All of us on the Committee believe that the law should be applied equally to all citizens of the United Kingdom, but currently that is not the case in this House, where, in matters of policing and public order, the point of public notification occurs not at the point of charge, as is the case with our constituents, but at the point of arrest That process of notification puts the police and the House at odds with the Data Protection Act and, potentially, article 8 of the European convention on human rights. Regardless of how people feel about the application of data protection and ECHR laws, that exposes both this House and the police to legal challenge by a named Member of Parliament.