Changing the threshold for excluding MPs from Parliament to Charge not Arrest would be a massive retrograde step

Parliament was due to hold a vote on plans to exclude from the Palace of Westminster MPs accused of sexual or violent crimes but the plans are to be watered down.

The recommendations were that when police notified authorities of an MP’s arrest, from that point they could be excluded from Parliament as a precautionary measure to protect staff. After several delays that plan is to be pulled and replaced by one which sets the threshold at the MP being charged.

Mike Clancy, General Secretary of Prospect, said:

“This is a massively retrograde step that will dismay all staff at Westminster. The Commission and the Leader of the House have bottled it.  We have repeatedly warned that every delay to implementing exclusion on arrest increased the likelihood of the proposals being watered down. We have, sadly, been proven correct.

“Coming as it does in the wake of the massive criticisms from MPs of the catastrophic approach to risk taken by the Met Police highlighted in the Angiolini report, it beggars belief that this measure to protect women and men on the estate has now been withdrawn. Workers in Parliament deserve to feel safe from credibly accused predators in their place of work. This would not be tolerated in any other workplace – it is to our shame that it is tolerated in the heart of our nation’s democracy.

“It is not too late to think again. A Parliament that demands that other organisations change their culture and procedures to keep women safe has no credibility on this issue if it cannot get its own house in order.”