Recall of MPs Bill — New Clause 2 — Prompting New Election for an MP via a Petition of 500 or More Electors — 24 Nov 2014 at 17:45

MPs were considering the Recall of MPs Bill^[1]. The majority of MPs voted against enabling a new election for a constituency's MP to be prompted by a petition of 500 or more electors to an election court alleging improper behaviour by their MP. This route to "recall" would have been added to the ways of triggering a new election already in the Bill which were an MP being convicted and sentenced to a period of imprisonment; or being suspended from the House of Commons for 10 sitting days (or 14 days).

The motion rejected by the majority of MPs taking part in this vote was:

• That the clause be read a Second time.

MP Julian Huppert, who moved the rejected clause, provided an explanation of its intended purpose^[2]:

• This new Clause establishes a further recall condition or trigger, independent of Parliament or criminal conviction, whereby five hundred or more constituents may petition an election court alleging improper behaviour on the part of their MP.

While the proposed new clause required the petition to be made to an election court, it did not appear to require that court to consider the allegation(s) made in the petition. A separate new proposed new clause which was also debated did state:

• The court must consider whether... it is reasonable to believe that the MP has misconducted himself or herself, to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public’s trust in the MP, without reasonable excuse or justification.

This vote however was only on the new clause describing the petition element, not the new clause describing the role of the court.

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• [1] Parliament's webpage on the recall of MPs Bill
• [2] Julian Huppert MP (Cambridge, Liberal Democrat), House of Commons, 24 November 2014

Debate in Parliament | Source |