Privileges and Conduct — House of Lords, 2018-11-15
Topic: Civil Rights
Meral Hussein-Ece (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I rise to speak as a minority in this debate. First, I am a woman; secondly, I am not a lawyer; and thirdly, I am not a friend of the noble Lord, Lord Lester. Having said that, I am very friendly with him—he is a colleague and I respect him enormously for the work he has done over his very long and distinguished career. Also, I have helped and supported women and girls who have faced unwanted sexual harassment in the workplace. Over 20 years ago in my career in local government and as a trade unionist, I sat on many disciplinary hearings of harassment in the workplace at which decisions had to be taken on whether the accused or the accuser was telling the truth. It was not a court of law but an internal disciplinary hearing and decisions had to be taken I myself was subjected to harassment when I was younger. I did not feel that I could complain about the individual, who was much more powerful than me—I was a very junior member of staff. I certainly do not think that I would have the courage to do what Ms Sanghera has done in this instance: make a complaint about someone who is obviously well connected and powerful. When looking at balancing this debate, we need to bear in mind how we are perceived outside our bubble here. Towards the end of his contribution, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, said that he would be concerned if, as a result of these sorts of cases, women were reluctant to come forward. If you think about it, why would they? There is adverse publicity and stress, and the effect on their family and friends is enormous. I am disappointed that some contributions have strayed into discussing Miss Sanghera as an individual, cherry picking from the report about what she did and did not do, her age, her conduct and what she may have achieved as a well-known woman in public life. When she came forward—I read what she said—she felt that she was a woman who for many decades had been encouraging other women to come forward, particularly from her and other minority communities. We in this Chamber express a lot of concern that these women do not have a voice. We care that in their own communities they may be repressed and not encouraged to go out into the workplace. She has done a lot of work encouraging girls and women to come forward—for example, those who might be subjected to forced marriage or FGM, or child brides. She has done a lot of work on that Because of what she alleges happened to her, she felt it would be hypocritical to advocate other girls coming forward if she herself could not come forward. That is a very logical explanation, and I accept that that is why she felt the need to do it after so many years, with the benefit of hindsight. She has been criticised, as have other women who have been victims of historical sexual abuse, rape or assault, for not coming forward at the time. I heard a Member of this House this morning on the radio saying that women should come forward straight away. If they do not go straight to the police—she did not say this, but it was implied—somehow they should not be believed. That is such a dangerous thing to say. What about those who have experienced historical child abuse? How is that going to be proved? How brave must those men and women be to come forward after decades when they suffered in the past? We have to very balanced and cautious in this debate. I am not going to stray into the legalities—I am not a lawyer—but I know about natural justice. I know what women go through and how difficult it is. I have some personal experience. My daughters have had personal experience. Most women have had personal experience of this Look at the report produced in the other place, in Parliament, on sexual harassment and bullying. The sheer numbers of staff being sexually harassed and bullied in the workplace by MPs was staggering. The argument could have been that maybe this is a new phenomenon. It is not, is it? The new phenomenon is that, thank God, we live in a society where women and girls can speak out. This is not acceptable behaviour. That we have not heard of it before does not excuse it. It is a good thing to shine a light on this sort of behaviour and, as lawmakers, stand up to ensure that it is unacceptable. We do not want this in a modern society. Why should women and girls be harassed sexually or made to feel uncomfortable in their workplace, and that they cannot complain because they may lose their jobs? This is totally wrong. I have been very uncomfortable. I know I am in a minority on my Benches, but I do not think I am in a minority with women outside this House. I believe that the tide has changed now, and we need to catch up with it. The fact that this is the first time these procedures were used for a case like this, and that there was never a procedure for sexual harassment before, makes the case that it was perceived that it could never happen. We know it does take place. We do not know the numbers or all the cases, but we know it happens I put it to those here who are better placed to put together a new set of procedures that we need procedures, if these are not fit for purpose, for this situation. I note that our procedures were never challenged before, with other Members who were judged and suspended from this House, or had sanctions against them. Why were they never challenged before if they are not fit for purpose? It seems strange that now they are being judged as not fit for purpose I urge that, if this motion is not supported today, we do not send out a message that women are not to be believed or that, because they delayed coming forward, somehow they—or the process we have chosen and used, the commissioner we voted for—should be criticised. We thought it was fine—why would we vote for this? With respect to many of the noble and learned Lords here, why did they never before flag up that this was not fit for purpose? Why did we not hear about that? I am sure we should have. With the benefit of hindsight, perhaps we need better procedures. More cases may well come forward. I have huge respect for my noble friend Lord McNally, but I just heard that he had never heard a whisper before.