Friday, July 20, 2018
A question of trust
The House of Commons whipping system is an esoteric subject at the best of times. It is hardly the subject of debate and controversy in living rooms up and down the country, and yet the pairing of MPs during crucial votes is essential to the successful running of the Government.
That is because pairing is not just used to cover for sick and pregnant MPs or because of travel problems, it also allows Ministers to get on with their jobs knowing that their absence during a division will not threaten the government's majority.
In the circumstances then, the decision of the Tory Chief Whip, Julian Smith to encourage paired MPs to break the agreement they had entered into and walk though the lobby in Tuesday's critical votes was not just a breach of trust, it was foolhardy in the extreme. He secured a short-term gain in exchange for trashing a system that could keep Theresa May in Number 10 Downing Street for longer.
It is little wonder that outrage is being expressed on all sides. That is especially so when, as The Times reports, claims by Smith that it was a cock-up are being disproved by those who were there.
The paper says that Julian Smith told a rival chief whip that he deliberately intended to break the pairing system in Tuesday’s critical vote:
Mr Smith, the Conservative chief whip, was already facing calls to resign this morning after The Times revealed that he urged three Tory MPs to abandon pairing arrangements shortly before the key vote on the customs union.
News of the further admission — that Mr Smith openly admitted he wanted to abandon a key parliamentary convention for a vote he faced losing — has further damaged his credibility among rival whips, with whom he must continue to work, and Tory MPs. The leak of information from a conversation between two chief whips underlines the extent to which the system has broken down.
As Lib Dem MP, Christine Jardine, says: “These allegations completely undermine the trust on which the pairing system depends. Cynical abuse to get the government through a difficult day is a sure fire way to corrode that trust. This situation is so serious that Downing Street can keep the system or they can save their chief whip. They can’t do both.
“There are so many questions the Tories still need to answer. The chief whip must come to parliament and be held accountable. Ultimately, if Andrea Leadsom and the prime minister have misled the House, this is a crisis. It is unclear how many more crises this threadbare government can withhold.”
If Theresa May does not act to remove Smith from his post as Chief Whip then her government will find it even more difficult to function effectively in future.
That is because pairing is not just used to cover for sick and pregnant MPs or because of travel problems, it also allows Ministers to get on with their jobs knowing that their absence during a division will not threaten the government's majority.
In the circumstances then, the decision of the Tory Chief Whip, Julian Smith to encourage paired MPs to break the agreement they had entered into and walk though the lobby in Tuesday's critical votes was not just a breach of trust, it was foolhardy in the extreme. He secured a short-term gain in exchange for trashing a system that could keep Theresa May in Number 10 Downing Street for longer.
It is little wonder that outrage is being expressed on all sides. That is especially so when, as The Times reports, claims by Smith that it was a cock-up are being disproved by those who were there.
The paper says that Julian Smith told a rival chief whip that he deliberately intended to break the pairing system in Tuesday’s critical vote:
Mr Smith, the Conservative chief whip, was already facing calls to resign this morning after The Times revealed that he urged three Tory MPs to abandon pairing arrangements shortly before the key vote on the customs union.
News of the further admission — that Mr Smith openly admitted he wanted to abandon a key parliamentary convention for a vote he faced losing — has further damaged his credibility among rival whips, with whom he must continue to work, and Tory MPs. The leak of information from a conversation between two chief whips underlines the extent to which the system has broken down.
As Lib Dem MP, Christine Jardine, says: “These allegations completely undermine the trust on which the pairing system depends. Cynical abuse to get the government through a difficult day is a sure fire way to corrode that trust. This situation is so serious that Downing Street can keep the system or they can save their chief whip. They can’t do both.
“There are so many questions the Tories still need to answer. The chief whip must come to parliament and be held accountable. Ultimately, if Andrea Leadsom and the prime minister have misled the House, this is a crisis. It is unclear how many more crises this threadbare government can withhold.”
If Theresa May does not act to remove Smith from his post as Chief Whip then her government will find it even more difficult to function effectively in future.
