Code of Conduct: Why We Need to Fix Parliament – and How to Do It

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Last month Boris Johnson faced criticism for choosing to register his holiday at a villa owned by his colleague Lord Goldsmith on the register of ministerial interests, rather than the one for MPs, which has a higher threshold for what details must be declared. The committee also proposes adding to theSeven Principles of Public Life, referred to as the “Nolan principles”, with an an eighth principle of “respect”, asking MPs to abide by the Parliamentary Behaviour Code and “demonstrate anti-discriminatory attitudes and behaviours through the promotion of anti-racism, inclusion and diversity”.

Chris Bryant has great expectations. Actually, he doesn’t. His engaging, thoughtful, powerful and funny book is just arguing for what are every day, run-of-the-mill, par-for-the-course, ordinary expectations. And his easy, warm, inclusive, engaging and honest writing style mirrors the man.But what readers will primarily want to know is how Sir Chris would sort out Parliament. His proposals include a ban on MPs having second jobs (with certain public-spirited exceptions, such as ‘NHS nurse’); extending the scope of the Lobbying Act; creating a new system for suspending MPs; slashing the number of peers to 180 (there are currently almost 800); and introducing cameras in the division lobbies (to discourage strong-arm tactics by whips). Chris Bryant can clearly remember the moment – 3.29pm, 3 November 2021. That was when the Labour MP and chair of the standards committee feared that democracy was done for. The previous week, an investigation by the parliamentary standards commissioner, Kathryn Stone, had found that Conservative MP Owen Paterson had committed “an egregious case of paid advocacy” to benefit two companies he was paid to advise, including the health firm Randox. Bryant’s committee recommended Paterson be suspended from the Commons for 30 sitting days, and now was the time for the house to vote on it. But prime minister Boris Johnson wasn’t happy with the findings or the recommendation, so the Tories did a very Johnsonian thing. They ripped up the rulebook. Former Conservative minister Andrea Leadsom proposed an amendment to pause Paterson’s suspension and set up a new Tory-led committee to examine how investigations should be carried out in future. Simple. If you don’t like justice, change the judiciary. Social media exploded. I was the most vindictive, vile, incompetent, power-crazed, woke-type, virtue-signalling, nose-stud wearing, Tory-hating, flipping social worker non-entity. Bryant left the church in 1991. Had you lost your faith? “No, it made me lose attendance. I’ve still got exactly the same faith I always had.” In the space of a few years, he did many different jobs – election agent for Labour MP Frank Dobson, author, insurance salesman, London manager of the charity Common Purpose. By now he had come to realise that his liberal conservatism was a better fit with New Labour. In 1997, he was the unsuccessful Labour candidate for Wycombe, then was hired by the BBC in a lobbying role as head of European affairs. Bryant is fond of quoting from popular songs to describe his life. This time he opts for I’m Still Here from the musical Follies. “In the words of Stephen Sondheim, ‘You career from career to career.’” Bryant shows that the 2019 generation of MPs are uniquely low calibre. Twenty-two have been sanctioned for unacceptable conduct since the general election – the highest number in recorded history.

It is because of small steps such as this that Bryant stresses he retains his instinctual whiggish optimism in spite of it all. What is more, his successful bid to increase the requirement needed to found the cross-party groups — while pertinent to a self-admitted “rules freak” — sits far from the summit of his reformist ambitions.The Crisis in British Journalism Byline Times investigates media monopolies, their proximity to politicians, and how the punditocracy doesn’t hold power to account Fact Articles predominantly based on historical research, official reports, court documents and open source intelligence. At the time Bryant told PoliticsHome ministers “can declare in both registers and often do”, and now his committee plans to close the exemption whereby ministers “are not required to register gifts and hospitality they receive in their ministerial capacity with the Commons Register”. Online Harms His analysis is spot-on. Bryant is super-smart and knows it. Self-criticism is often tempered by a boast. He quotes another Tory MP who warned him the night before he spoke in the Paterson debate. “Mark Fletcher said to me, ‘You have to be very careful, Chris, because you are 80% brilliant and 20% crap,’ so I had to make sure none of the crap was in what I had to say.” He thinks it’s a funny quote, and admits he can be rude, abrupt, sarcastic, angry. What does he do when he gets angry? “I play the Dies Irae from Verdi’s Requiem. It punches out the anger.”