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Privileges Committee: Second Report

I wish only to make a brief comment on the work done by the Sub-Committee on Lords’ Interests. It has done an excellent job in revising the guide to the rules of conduct prepared by the Eames committee and in proposing a change in the name. I can identify few changes between the original guide and what is now proposed. However, there is one change to which I should draw attention. In paragraph 119 of the original guide, the Sub-Committee on Lords’ Interests, as it was then to be called, had the task of resolving any significant contested issues of fact. That is, as I understand it, no longer to be the case, as one can see from comparing paragraph 119 of the original guide to paragraph 130 of the revised guide. Thus the facts are to be found by the commissioner and those facts are final, subject only to appeal under paragraph 131 to the Committee for Privileges itself. Paragraph 133 of the revised guide provides that, ""the Committee will not reopen the Commissioner’s investigation"." I wish only to ask whether my understanding of the position is correct and, if so, to say that it is an important improvement on what was there before.