Kemi Badenoch has said people must “treat each other with respect” as she backed a report that found a Conservative baroness should face a three-week Lords suspension for calling a peer “Lord Poppadom”.
The Tory leader said the recommendations of Parliament’s standards watchdog should be followed after complaints against Baroness Catherine Meyer were upheld in a conduct review.
The peer was found to have twice referred to British-Asian Lord Dholakia as “Lord Poppadom” and to have touched MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy’s braids without her permission.
The incidents occurred during a visit by Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which she was a member, to Rwanda in February, the standards commissioner said.
In a report, the Conduct Committee backed his recommendation for Lady Meyer to be suspended from the upper chamber for three weeks and undergo “bespoke behaviour training.”
Asked about the findings on a visit to Essex on Friday, Ms Badenoch told the PA news agency: “The committee has ruled, I think it’s important that all of those rulings are followed. Obviously this was a personal incident I was not privy to. I have not seen the report, but we need to make sure that we all treat each other with respect at all times.”
Lady Meyer was found to have breached harassment rules with her behaviour towards both parliamentarians, with the “racial element” involved in the first case considered to be an aggravating factor.
She is said to have called Lord Dholakia as “Lord Poppadom” during a taxi journey on the trip, having previously apologised for mistakenly referring to him as “Lord Popat”, another peer of South Asian heritage.
Lady Meyer initially denied the allegation, but after hearing witness evidence said the incident took place at the end of a long day after she had drunk “possibly three glasses of wine”, the Lords’ Conduct Committee said.
Parliament’s standards commissioner found that “on the balance of probabilities” she had used the phrase twice and that the harassment “related to race”.
Lord Dholakia said it had made him “very annoyed, very angry that people should use expressions of this particular nature”.
In a separate incident on the same visit, Lady Meyer complimented Ms Ribeiro-Addy’s hair and asked her if she could touch it, before doing so without waiting for a reply or permission.
Ms Ribeiro-Addy said it had made her feel “extremely uncomfortable” and “as if she could just do whatever she wanted”.
In responding to the Clapham and Brixton Hill MP’s complaint, Lady Meyer said that she had intended a friendly gesture, and had been unaware that it would be unwelcome.
She said she understood from Ms Ribeiro-Addy’s subsequent body language that: “Oh, gosh, I did the wrong thing”.
In a report published on Thursday, the Conduct Committee said: “We have carefully considered the Commissioner’s report and his proposed sanction.
“Taking all the relevant factors into account, we endorse his recommended sanction, and accordingly recommend to the House that Baroness Meyer be suspended from the service of the House for three weeks, and that she undertake bespoke behaviour training.”
Lady Meyer’s office has been contacted for comment.
