Entangled Alliances

Buried in the headlines yesterday was the news that Scotland Yard has decided not to prosecute any of the Labour peers involved in the peers-for-hire controversy uncovered by the Sunday Times two weeks ago. This is what John Yates, assistant commissioner of the Met police, had to say on the matter:

The application of the criminal law to members of the House of Lords in the circumstances that have arisen here is far from clear. In addition, there are very clear difficulties in gathering and adducing evidence in these circumstances in the context of parliamentary privilege.

These factors, when set alongside the preliminary examination, lead us to the decision that the Metropolitan police will not undertake a criminal inquiry into any of the allegations raised.

Oh, okay. I understand. So parliamentary privilege protects anyone in Parliament from being prosecuted, right? That’s why no MP has ever been charged with any criminal activity concerning their dealings in Parliament, right? Or is it just the House of Lords where being caught in the act is no longer good enough? The Sunday Times sting involved peers literally haggling over the price of changing legislation in front of undercover reporters. How is this not enough for a criminal charge? What more do they want, a signed confession and a peer cackling “I’d do it all over again if I had the chance! Mwahaha!”

Putting aside the Met’s Inspector Clouseau approach to investigating peers,  reform of the House of Lords cannot come soon enough. The principle reforms that need to be addressed are pretty obvious. First, though it’s true that Lords are banned from “exercising parliamentary influence” in exchange for money, it’s also true that there aren’t any real sanctions for doing so and no, “naming and shaming” is not a proper sanction. If corrupt peers aren’t going to face criminal charges, then at the very least they should be expelled from the Lords for a set period or, even better, face outright expulsion.

Second, you need to clear up the gaping loopholes in what peers are allowed to do in their advisory capacity and what they aren’t. You could drive a souped-up truck through the gap between what you’re not allowed to do – receive  money for changing the law – and what you can get away with – receive money for advising on the parliamentary process. Personally, I think the whole idea of a peer being a paid consultant for anyone is  pretty seedy and ripe for exploitation. Why not simplify matters and ban consultancy altogether? Most consultancy work is no doubt deemed essential because peers are not given an annual salary. The surprising solution to this is to… give them an annual salary!

Finally, you need to encourage transparency. Is a peer advising someone on the side for a bit of cash? Fine, but tell us about it. Does a Lord engaged in amending a business bill have a corporate background that might, shall we say, have an effect on their judgement? Then tell us about it! If they are in fact not serving special interests but acting for the public good, then they have nothing to hide by disclosing possible conflicts of interests.

Once those three issues are dealt with, it might be wise to take a good look at how the (supposedly) neutral Lords Appointments Commission chooses new members  – less Labour-friendly sycophants and more independent-minded peers, please.

Many people would go on to argue – as indeed they did in most of the broadsheets following the recent revelations – that we need to go still further and elect the Lords.  This idea, however, isn’t quite as straightforward as most people think and might, in fact, be a very bad one. But that’s an argument for another post…