Government seeks cross-party agreement in U-turn over Paterson vote

Jacob Rees-Mogg has announced a government U-turn over the House of Commons vote that sought to establish a new committee tasked with overhauling the system responsible for scrutinising the conduct of MPs.

The move comes after a backlash from Tory MPs who have been critical of the amendment they passed yesterday and amid reports that Conservatives have been receiving angry communications from constituents.

The climbdown was made necessary after Labour declared that it would boycott the new committee voted for by Tory MPs yesterday. The government will bring forward fresh proposals built on a cross-party basis.

The Commons had voted by 250 to 232, a majority of 18 with those in favour almost all being Conservatives under a three-line whip, to reject the 30-day suspension of Owen Paterson recommended by the standards committee.

The Tory MPs voted for an amendment by Andrea Leadsom that would have set up a new committee to review the system, chaired by John Whittingdale, a friend of Paterson, and dominated by Tory MPs. But this now seems to have been shelved.

It also appears that any new system will apply not to Paterson, who has been consistently defended by Boris Johnson and cabinet ministers, but only to “future cases”, as Rees-Mogg said MPs felt it should not be “applied retrospectively”.

The leader of the House of Commons told MPs this morning: “I’m also aware that last night’s vote has created a certain amount of controversy. It is important that standards in this House are done on a cross-party basis.

“The House voted very clearly yesterday to show that it is worried about the process of handling these complaints and that we would like an appeals system. But the change would need to be on a cross-party basis and that is clearly not the case.

“While there is a very strong feeling on both sides of the House that there is a need for an appeals process, there is equally a strong feeling that this should not be based on a single case or applied retrospectively.

“I fear last night’s debate conflated the individual case with the general concern. This link needs to be broken. Therefore I and others will be looking to work on a cross-party basis to achieve improvements for future cases.”

It is understood there will be a fresh vote on the 30-day suspension of Owen Paterson that was recommended by the parliamentary standards committee, after the MP was found guilty of an “egregious” breach of lobbying rules.

Chris Bryant, the chair of the standards committee, has told the Commons that the committee “could produce another report next Tuesday, which the government could then put to the House next week, to deal with the case of Mr Paterson”.

“The government’s pathetic attempt to hide from their actions doesn’t fix anything,” Labour’s Thangam Debbonaire said. “Last night, they voted to allow corruption to take place unimpeded at the heart of British politics.

“MPs must now vote to uphold the sanctions against Owen Paterson. Any other result will allow Boris Johnson to create one rule for Tory MPs, another for everyone else.”