To ask HMG why Members of Parliament and members of the House of Lords are excluded from Clause 11, “Offence of misleading the public”, of the Public Office (Accountability) Bill; and what consideration they have given to removing this exclusion.

I called this debate and gave this speech to the House:

The Public Office (Accountability) Bill has rightly been recognised for its proposed duty of candour, but there is another provision within it, less understood, yet vastly more consequential: the creation, for the first time in modern democratic history, of a criminal offence of misleading the public. It provides that, where a public official, including our very own Prime Minister, knowingly or recklessly deceives the public on a matter of significant public concern, and if that deception is proven to the criminal standard, a prison sentence of up to two years may follow. In short, the Prime Minister is proposing to criminalise lying in politics for the first time and he is leading by example by applying it to himself. This has never happened before and I congratulate the Government on being brave and decent enough to criminalise lying by their own Ministers. It is a very big step.

This Bill has been commonly called the Hillsborough law because of the stadium crush in 1989 in Hillsborough, Sheffield, in which 97 Liverpool supporters were unlawfully killed. That was followed by years in which police and other officials advanced misleading accounts that falsely blamed the victims, deceived families over the pain that their loved ones suffered before death and obscured institutional failings. The sustained campaign by the bereaved families for truth and accountability led to the Hillsborough Law Now movement and to the introduction in Parliament of this Bill. It is intended to impose a statutory duty of candour and to criminalise serious deception by public officials. It is worth noting that the inaccurate account by Sheffield police has never been corrected, which is something that the Government should resolve. Among others, the Hicks family lost two daughters and they, and other still-grieving families, deserve the truth.

This Bill will correct an inconsistency. For centuries, we have criminalised deception in almost every professional sphere, except for some politicians. Fraud is an offence, perjury is an offence and false advertising is unlawful. Under consumer protection legislation, tradesmen may not mislead the public about serious matters. In finance, commerce, the courts and taxation, truthfulness is not optional; it is legally enforceable. We already accept, under the Representation of the People Act, that dishonest statements about a rival candidate during an election may be criminal. The principle that deliberate political falsehoods can be legislated against is therefore not novel. It has existed for decades without overwhelming the courts or extinguishing debate.

No equivalent statutory standard has governed broader public claims made by politicians. That anomaly can be set against the collapse of public trust. The Ipsos Veracity Index once again ranks politicians among the least trusted professions in the UK. That distrust weakens democratic consent, discourages civic participation and feeds a corrosive cynicism that democratic institutions cannot be trusted and that Parliament is full of liars. It makes the lives of Members of the Commons and the Lords much harder and doubtless impacts our well-being as well.

But the Bill offers some hope. The proposed new offence of misleading the public attempts to respond to that crisis, not by criminalising opinion, silencing debate or punishing error or failed prediction but by addressing something narrower and more serious: deliberate or reckless deception about matters of significant concern to the public, proven beyond reasonable doubt.

Some have raised concerns about free expression. Those concerns deserve respect, but the offence, as drafted, is confined to intentional or reckless deception. It does not criminalise political disagreement, capture advocacy or police rhetoric. It does not apply to anything said in Parliament, as privilege is still in place. It targets only proven deceit elsewhere, such as online, on television, on the radio or at events. I hope that this narrow definition will stop people with expensive lawyers launching malicious legal cases in the hope of silencing legitimate criticisms. In short, this provision affirms a simple democratic proposition: those who exercise public authority should not be permitted to lie to the public with impunity.

So far, so good. Yet the following exemptions have been brought to my attention by campaigner Marcus Ball of ExecProsec, who is working with Jennifer Nadel of Compassion in Politics and Luke Myer MP from the other place. As currently drafted, the proposition excludes some parliamentarians. Civil servants would be bound by it, as would police officers, members of the Armed Forces, NHS staff, Government Ministers and even the Prime Minister, but Back-Bench Members of Parliament and Members of this House would not, nor would the shadow Cabinet or the Opposition in their entirety.

There may be procedural explanations for excluding Peers and Back-Bench MPs, and even technical constitutional arguments, but I wonder what the public will think. They will see a law that criminalises deception by nearly every category of public official except the very people who are making the Bill become law. They will not be persuaded by constitutional nuance; they will draw a much simpler conclusion. If Parliament legislates a requirement not to lie for others while reserving exemption for itself, the perception will be that we parliamentarians are hypocrites. That perception will endure each time the offence is invoked, a prosecution is considered, accountability is pursued or any parliamentarian is accused of being dishonest. The public will be reminded that parliamentarians chose to criminalise lying by almost all public officials apart from themselves.

Equality before the law is the foundation of democratic legitimacy. If nurses, teachers, civil servants, Ministers and even the Prime Minister are to be subject to this standard, it is impossible to persuasively justify a position in which Members of either House of Parliament are not. Surely, those who make the law should be subject to the same standard of honesty that we, as legislators, impose on others.

This House has long seen itself as the guardian of constitutional principle. We are uniquely placed to consider not only how legislation functions in the courts but how it will be understood by the public. I am concerned that if we do not apply this law to ourselves, we will cause reputational self-harm. We are legislators; we pass laws that relate to everyone else, so why should they not relate to us as well?

To conclude, I have a couple of questions for the Minister. I sense that the Government will probably not accept what I am saying, but I wonder whether she will meet me at a future date to discuss this, perhaps with one or two lawyers who can argue more persuasively than I can. Why are Members of Parliament, in both Houses, excluded from Clause 11? Will the Government give serious consideration to removing that exclusion, so that the Bill may stand as a testament to integrity rather than a monument to hypocrisy?

Hansard record here