Andrew Bridgen who FAILS in bid to overturn five-day suspension

2022-12-21

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen who ‘flouted parliamentary rules on lobbying’ FAILS in bid to overturn five-day suspension after watchdog ruled he had a ‘very cavalier’ attitude to rules

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen has failed to appeal his suspension over lobbying
Parliamentary watchdog found he had ‘very cavalier’ attitude to rules
The IEP told the him that he could have been handed a ‘more severe’ punishment

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen has failed in his bid to overturn his recommended five-day suspension for a ‘very cavalier’ series of breaches of lobbying rules.

The Independent Expert Panel (IEP) dismissed his appeal ‘on all grounds’ and told the backbencher that he could reasonably have been handed a ‘more severe’ punishment.

The North West Leicestershire MP initially accepted the Commons Standards Committee’s findings, before calling for a reversal by Parliament’s appeal panel.

According to the IEP report, Mr Bridgen criticised standards commissioner Kathryn Stone’s investigation as ‘flawed’ for multiple reasons in his appeal. But this was swiftly rejected.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen has failed in his bid to overturn his five-day suspension after he was found to have displayed a ‘very cavalier’ attitude to the rules in a series of lobbying breaches

He targeted the committee for failing, as he saw it, to consider the ‘journalistic or political motivation’ of the complaint against him. The IEP said this point was ‘completely irrelevant’.

On the suspension, the panel chaired by retired lord justice of appeal Sir Stephen Irwin ruled that Mr Bridgen did ‘no more than assert that the sanctions recommended by the Committee were excessive’.

‘We disagree. Indeed, in our view the sanctions for breach of the rule against paid advocacy and for the email letter could properly and fairly have been more severe,’ their report said.

‘It follows that we dismiss this appeal on all grounds.’

MPs are set to vote on whether to uphold the five-day suspension recommended, while an apology to the Commons from Mr Bridgen was also recommended.

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