Owen Paterson, an ex-Minister of Cabinet, will be suspended for a month from the House of Commons. He was accused of lobbying for companies he used to work for.
The ex-Environment Secretary broke parliamentary rules on paid advocacy while acting as a £100,000 consultant for Randox, a clinical diagnostics company, and Lynn’s Country Foods.
The North Shropshire MP, 65 years old, denied the charges and claimed last week that the ‘cruel investigation’ played a ‘great part’ in Rose’s death last year.
He doubled down on this attack today in the wake of the report from the Parliamentary Committee on Standards, saying the investigation against him was ‘biased’.
In a statement, he stated that the cost to him and his three grown-up kids from the manner in which this investigation was conducted had been catastrophic.
“Last summer, Rose, my wife of 40-years, took her own suicide in the midst a thorough investigation.” We will never know what caused her suicide but we do know that the manner inwhich this investigation was conducted played an important role.
The committee said today that “no other case of paid advocacy” has ever seen such many violations or a clear pattern in failing to seperate private and public interests.
The ex-Environment Secretary broke parliamentary rules on paid advocacy while acting as a £100,000 consultant for Randox, a clinical diagnostics company, and Lynn’s Country Foods.
The North Shropshire MP, aged 65, denied the charge and last Wednesday claimed that the cruel’ investigation had ‘played an important part’ in Rose’s 2017 death.
According to the report, ‘Mr Paterson’s wife took her own death in June 2020. It is possible that Mr Paterson’s grief and distress from this event may have affected his approach to the commissioner’s investigation.
In October 2019, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards opened an investigation into allegations that Owen Paterson improperly lobbied to Lynn’s Country Foods and Randox.
The commissioner found that the North Shropshire MP had violated the rule against paid advocacy in the MPs Code of Conduct. The MP made three approaches in 2017 to the Food Standards Agency regarding Randox and the testing of antibiotics for milk in November 2016/2017.
He was also found to be in violation of the rule for making seven approaches to Lynn’s Country Foods agency between November 2017- July 2018, and four approaches in the Department for International Development to ministers relating to Randox, blood testing technology, October 2016 and January 2017.
He also broke the Code of Conduct for declarations of interest by failing, in four emails to Food Standards Agency, to declare his role of a paid consultant to Lynn between November 2016 to January 2018.
Also, Mr Paterson violated the code regarding use of parliamentary services by using his parliamentary offices for business meetings with clients on 25 occasions from October 2016 to February 2020. He also sent two letters relating business interests on House of Commons headed paper in October 2016 as well as January 2017.
After reviewing the findings of Commissioner, the Committee on Standards recommended that he is suspended for 30 consecutive days.
Its report stated that: ‘The Committee found that Mr Paterson’s actions had been an egregious case for paid advocacy. He repeatedly used his privileged status to benefit two businesses for which he was paid a consultant and that this has brought disrepute on the House.