Norman Baker attacks MPs for seeking to exempt themselves from Freedom of Information Legislation in an article for the Mail on Sunday.


For the first time in my life, I am ashamed to be a Member of Parliament.

The House of Commons has never looked as self-serving, as smug, as out of touch as it did on Friday when the disgraceful Bill to exempt MPs from the Freedom of Information Act was rammed through.

Do the MPs who voted for this odious Bill not realise how all this looks to the ordinary person in the street?

What kind of Parliament is it that votes to impose freedom of information requirements on every public body in the land, and then votes to exempt itself from it?

What kind of Parliament is it that cannot find more than one MP to speak in favour of a Bill, yet finds spineless MPs to force it through, and to vote to stop MPs who want to speak against the Bill from doing so?

What kind of a Parliament is it that has a government that professes neutrality on a Bill, yet behind the scenes pressures those on the Ministerial ladder to come in on a Friday to vote in favour?

The mover of the Bill, the former Tory chief whip David Maclean, told the House that his Bill was to protect the sanctity of correspondence between MPs and constituents, and the “priest-like” relationship this engenders.

What absolute tosh.

Of course such correspondence must be confidential, but it already is, under the Data Protection Act 1998. Anyone releasing such correspondence into the public domain is committing an offence.
 

The Information Commissioner has not received a single complaint from an MP’s constituent about the inappropriate release of correspondence, and nor is the House of Commons library aware of any example.

If there is a problem, and no MP has been able to stand one up, then the answer must be better advice to public bodies on how to deal with data protection issues. Instead, we are told a new law is required. But why should people respect a new law any more than the one that already exists?

No, the real reason for this Bill lies not with the red herring that is MPs’ correspondence, but with the smell of rotting fish that is MPs trying to cover up their expenses and protect themselves from the unwelcome public gaze that comes when this information is published.

The last straw for many appears to have been my successful Freedom of Information application for MPs’ travel expenses to be published in full. This was fought tooth and nail, and at vast public expense, by the House of Commons Commission, the same shadowy body whose fingerprints are all over this disgraceful Bill.

The figures, when finally wrung out of them, were deeply embarrassing for some MPs, whose travel claims were shown to be way in excess of those submitted by their neighbours.

But rather than deal with this problem, the answer instead has been to try to draw a veil of secrecy over the whole business, so MPs can once again go about their expense claims in private.

David Maclean, in promoting his Bill, made much of a letter of comfort sent to him by the Speaker, promising that the information now available would continue to be released. Such a promise, of course, is no substitute for a legislative requirement and cannot in any case bind the hands of a future Speaker. The exemption from FoI also neatly kills off the various applications for further information which are presently in the pipeline.

On Wednesday, the Speaker promised that every MP who wanted to speak in Friday’s debate would be able to do so. Many of us welcomed that assurance.

What happened on the day, however, was very different. We saw a succession of requests from David Maclean to shut up those opposed to the Bill, each put to the vote with alacrity by the Deputy Speakers, even though many MPs were trying to be called to speak, and each supported by a swathe of largely Labour MPs who appeared from nowhere to vote to prevent other MPs from speaking.

It is the convention of the House that MPs do not criticise or question the Chair. I deeply regret that I cannot observe that convention today. The Standing Orders of the House make it perfectly clear that the Chair has the authority to resist proposals to curtail business and prevent MPs from speaking. The specific Standing Order most relevant here, No 36, expressly refers to the need to protect minorities in these circumstances.
 

That votes to gag MPs were allowed, not once but three times, is nothing short of outrageous, particularly with a Bill as self-serving as this. I am making a formal complaint to the Speaker.

Very few MPs come out of this most shameful episode with any credit.  I have criticised David Maclean, but at least he was prepared to put his name to this Bill and alone seek to defend it in the House. I do not blame him for trying to use what parliamentary tactics are available to progress his case.

The same cannot be said for the Labour and Conservative front benches, who innocently professed neutrality while secretly conniving with Mr Maclean to get his Bill through.

As for Gordon Brown, he told us only a few days ago that he wanted to clean up politics and make a new start. It seems all he wanted was a new soundbite. He has been challenged all week to make a statement on this Bill. My colleague Sir Menzies Campbell even wrote to him on the subject. But from Gordon, words there came none.

If our Prime Minister-in-waiting had simply let it be known that he was against the Bill, most of the Labour MPs who voted on Friday would have seen which way the wind was blowing, and melted away. But he didn’t. Gordon has flunked it, and fallen at the first hurdle, even before he has crossed the threshold of No 10.

Thankfully, there were some MPs prepared to stand up and be counted, especially Mark Fisher and David Winnick from Labour, Richard Shepherd for the Conservatives, who made a wonderful impassioned speech, and a strong contingent of Lib Dems, most notably Simon Hughes.

The fight goes on, and we can only hope now that the House of Lords will, unlike the Commons, put principle before self-interest.

In the meantime, the reputation of Parliament has taken a body-blow from which it will not be easy to recover. The public will look at what MPs have done and will see a bunch of people looking after their own interests in a shameless, arrogant and hypocritical way. They will be right.

This article is based on an article by Norman Baker MP that appeared in the Mail on Sunday on 20th May