QUESTION OF PRIVILEGE (Hansard, 9 January 1978)

§ Mr. John Ellis

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I should like to raise a matter of privilege about which I sought to give your prior notice. It relates to a copy of the Observer of Sunday 8th January. Page 1 carries an article headed: MPs to Call for Secret Steel Papers There then follows a considerable article on pages 1 and 2. For example, it says on page 2 that The report will recommend and there then follow certain items which the Select Committee will bring before the House. This is a Select Committee of the House. It is presenting its first report, which I think is due for publication on Wednesday. At this time it is not available to hon. Members.

Anyone who has read this article will realise that it contains detailed information about what the recommendations of that Select Committee are likely to be. I would ask for your guidance, Mr. Speaker, on whether you think it is right to refer this matter to the Committee of Privilege. However, there may be difficulties about this, and that is another point which I ask you to consider.

I understand that technically the report of the Select Committee must be laid on the Table so that the House can give its permission for the printing thereof. At that point it is not available to the House, because it is in draft form. It becomes available to the House only when it is published. There is, therefore, a technicality in this regard.

I have been advised by Officers of the House, to whom I am obliged, that in ruling on such matters Mr. Speaker often says that he deprecates the practice of anyone leaking information in this way, but that, as the report was technically on the Table of the House, the situation presents certain difficulties.

The appropriate Sub-Committee of the Select Committee sat for about 18 months on this particular matter. As we all know, there is a crisis in the steel industry. We in this House are about to consider it in a serious way, perhaps as the present Session continues. Members of Parliament are involved. It is an area which affects all aspects of our public life. The constituency interests of indivi- 1268 dual Members are referred to in detail. That is clearly unsatisfactory and that is a further point to be considered if, technically, the matter cannot be sent to the Committee of Privileges.

Over the weekend hon. Members have been telephoned and badgered. Out of courtesy I informed the two hon. Members who are Chairman of the Sub-Committee of the Select Committee and Chairman of the full Select Committee on Nationalised Industries that I intended to raise this matter. They have certainly been badgered over the weekend, as have many other hon. Members. They have been asked to comment on matters that vitally affect the country and their constituents although the details in the article can be only part of a report which hon Members have not yet received. How can hon. Members comment on such matters such in this particular situation?

It is a grave situation and one which cannot be tolerated. We cannot conduct our business in this way. I do not want to accuse anyone about anything, but the fact is that these are grave issues. I ask you, Mr. Speaker, to take these two matters into consideration.

Perhaps, because of the technicality of the report lying on the Table, you cannot recommend that this matter should go to the Committee of Privileges. But it may be that you could make recommendations to other bodies whereby we can stop this sort of thing happening. There is no question of the House or Commons seeking to hush up matters. That is not the case. Rather, it is the House of Commons exercising a watchdog procedure in respect of a Sub-Committee that laboured for 18 months producing a very important report which will be revealed in its entirety on Wednesday.

Under the present system anyone who is malevolent, or who has vested interests, can get hold of such a report and slant it in a particular way. I ask for your earnest consideration of this matter which has been followed up in the national newspapers—in The Guardian and perhaps others—before hon. Members of this House have seen the report in its entirety.