Senior figures who worked with controversial Speaker John Bercow say that there has been an ‘establishment stitch-up’ in failing to investigate the outgoing chair according to reports in The Sunday Telegraph.
Former Black Rod David Leakey and ex-private secretary Angus Sinclair have accused the establishment of attempting to suppress reports into Bercow.
The Mail on Sunday said:
It was announced last week that the parliamentary authorities were opening the Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme to former staff and would hear allegations dating back to before 2017.
The development comes more than a year after a report by Dame Laura Cox, a former High Court judge, warned of ‘deference and silence’ being used to cover up misconduct occurring in Westminster.
But Mr Sinclair, who broke a non-disclosure agreement to speak out about alleged bullying by Mr Bercow in 2018, told the newspaper the ‘horse has long bolted’ in terms of probing the Speaker’s behaviour.
The 60-year-old has accused the former Tory MP of mimicking him and said he was prone to ‘over-the-top anger’.
He said the inaction regarding the bullying allegations was proof that ‘as yet the House of Commons is not a safe place’.
‘The last year has shown me that when [the Commons] feels it’s got more important things to do, that sort of thing [bullying] doesn’t matter,’ said Mr Sinclair, who was in the Royal Navy for 30 years.
Mr Leakey, 67, in 2018 described an incident where the ‘red mist descended’ on Mr Bercow, who he said ‘banged the table, yelled and was highly insulting to me personally’.
The former lieutenant general in the Army said Mr Bercow should be denied the usual peerage bestowed upon former Commons speakers.
‘The icing on the cake of an establishment stitch-up in the public perception would be for Mr Bercow to be given a peerage,’ warned Mr Leakey, who who was one of the most senior officials in the Lords from 2011 to 2017.
‘It would be a scandal that Parliament would struggle to live down.’
A spokesman for Mr Bercow insisted there was ‘no substance’ to the allegations by either man and he has always denied claims that he has bullied staff.
Leading the charge for these investigations has been top barrister Rebecca Butler who has herself written numerous letters and encouraged tens of thousands of people to lobby Parliamentary authorities to conduct this investigation.
Speaking exclusively to UNN Rebecca said:
“Ever since 17.4m people answered a simple question in 2016, expectations of decency and fair play have been eroded. Precisely because they are decent people, they haven’t taken to the streets. They don’t shout, they don’t have time or money to march. Instead they pick up their pens and put pressure on the institutions that have let them down. It works. The pen is always mightier than the sword. “
This comes as Sir Bernard Jenkin has hinted John Bercow’s days as Speaker of the House of Commons could be numbered, telling Parliament an influential committee on which he sits was poised to launch a wide-ranging hearing on the “Speaker’s role”.
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