Friday 9 March 2012

Lords conflict of interest investigation: Letter of complaint sent into Commissioner for Standards

Social Investigations have sent in a complaint to the Commissioner for Standards at the House of Lords below. The complaint is part of an ongoing investigation into conflicts of interest in relation to the Lords and private healthcare companies.

To date, eighty Lords have been found to have direct financial links to companies involved in private health care. The investigation will undoubtedly bring about more conflicts of interest before moving onto MPs of all parties, of which many have already been found.

The conflicts of interest are made worse because despite registering their interests, Lords are still able to vote. The Lord in question is Lord Hamilton of Epsom who has a directorship of a management consultancy company called MSB Ltd.He voted loyally on the Health and Social Care bill.

The House of Lords Commissioner for Standards
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PA

9th March 2011

On the 13th February 2012 - Hansard source (Citation: HL Deb, 13 February 2012, c556) – Lord Hamilton stated in a discussion on ‘NHS: Management Consultants — Private Notice Question’ 3:07 pm.

'My Lords, surely one of the problems of the National Health Service is the wall of money that was thrown at a totally unreformed NHS by the last Government? Do we not need management consultants now to show us the way forward on the savings that need to be wrung out of the NHS so that it can survive into the future?'

 Lord Hamilton has registered interests as a directorship for MSB Ltd (management consultancy)

He doesn’t appear to have announced his interests before speaking.

The link if this helps to the discussion is –
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/lords/?id=2012-02-13a.554.2#g556.6

The rule that appears to be broken is: Under para 10(b) of the Lords Code of Conduct, Peers must declare when speaking in the House, or communicating with ministers or public servants, any interest which is a relevant interest in the context of the debate or the matter under discussion.

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