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House of Lords: Code of Conduct

My Lords, perhaps I can say just a few words. I support the report and I hope that it goes through without amendment, because it is of good quality. I generally take the view that the declaration of an interest is the most important thing that a member of any legislature can do because, by and large, people in this House, any other House or outside will make a sound judgment as to what are your motivations when you make a speech or act in any way. Obviously, voting is critical and you should not vote where there is a financial interest. Having said that, I have already raised one concern in principle with the Leader of the House and a few others and in one of the committees at which Members spoke. It concerns five magic words that appear several times in the report, most notably at page 27 in paragraph 15. I will not cite the whole paragraph, but just the last sentence, which states: ""Members of the House should be especially cautious in deciding whether to speak or vote in relation to interests that are direct, pecuniary and shared by few others"." What do the words "and shared by few others" mean? I tried to find out. I asked two members of the committee and one Clerk who had some responsibility for drafting them. My noble friend on the Front Bench may have been able to do rather better research than I, but I have yet to get an answer to that. I understand that they first appeared in a 1995 Resolution of the House. They were then taken out of the Companion in 2001, but put back in again in 2003—at paragraph 480, I believe. They are important words, because they could undermine the meaning of that paragraph or reinforce it. If nobody knows what they mean, that is a concern. If they have no meaning, at some suitable point in future and without interfering with anything else that we do today, we ought to omit them. If they are there for a reason, we ought to know what that reason is. I asked myself that question, and I ought to run past the House the only examples that I could come up with in case they are the reason. The first is that it could possibly relate to shareholdings where people hold shares in a company common to many. That seems unlikely, but it is possible. I then thought—and if this is correct, it is a bit more worrying—that it might relate to certain professions or groups which are in the House in some significant number. To use an obvious example, I have noticed that there are quite a few lawyers in this House. I have often thought that lawyers speaking in this House need to declare an interest more often than they frequently do. A most obvious case is where legal aid may be involved in any way and there is a pecuniary advantage either to a chamber or to that lawyer. Let me make it absolutely clear that I do not want to stop lawyers speaking, including on such matters. Indeed, it is important that they do speak, but not if, ""and shared by few others"," means letting the lawyers off the hook. The other group that occurred to me was farmers, who again often have general subsidy advantages and frankly ought to declare an interest more often than they do. Again, I emphasise that I do not want to stop them speaking—indeed, I want to encourage them to speak because what they have to say is often very important and very helpful to the House—but I can think of no other possible explanation of why those five words are there. I would be glad if my noble friend could enlighten me when she sums up. If not, can we take a longer look at this and either drop those words or have a note telling us whether we are one of the few or one of the many?