Andrew Bridgen
(Picture: PA Wire)Tory MP Andrew Bridgen is facing a five day suspension from the House of Commons for displaying a “very cavalier” attitude to lobbying rules and attacking the integrity of Parliament’s standards watchdog.
The MP for North West Leicestershire, an outspoken critic of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, was found to have committed three breaches of the MPs’ code of conduct in his lobbying work for a company called Mere Plantations.
But Mr Bridgen was also censured for sending an email to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, Kathryn Stone, which was “calculated to influence” her consideration of his case.
MPs will now vote on whether to accept the committee’s recommendation to suspend him. But following the publication of the report, Mr Bridgen said: “Whilst I am extremely disappointed with the recommendations of the committee, I accept them and will comply with them as required to do so.”
The report published by Parliament’s Standards Committee on Thursday morning detailed how Mr Bridgen was first introduced to the Cheshire-based Mere Plantations by one of his constituents, Jamie Mackenzie, who was Sales Director of a second firm called The Curious Guys Ltd.
According to the report, Ms Stone said Curious Guys acted as the sales function for Mere, which was engaged in the reforestation of degraded forest land in Ghana. The report states: “Mr Mackenzie made initial contact with Mr Bridgen on 12 September 2018.
“Following the introduction to Mere Plantations, Mr Bridgen made several approaches to Ministers and public officials, in person and via email, relating to Mere Plantations between November 2018 and August 2021. These approaches primarily concerned the treatment of Mere Plantations activities by HMRC, and the sale or trading of carbon credits.”
The report also set out how Mere Plantations paid for flights and accommodation for Mr Bridgen to visit their plantation in Ghana between 4 August to 7 August 2019 at a cost of £3,251.51.
Mere Plantations also made a donation of £5,000 to the North West Leicestershire Conservative Association on 31 October 2019, which Mr Bridgen registered on 2 January 2020.
Later that year, the report states, Mr Bridgen accepted an offer to act as an adviser to Mere Plantations signing a contract which said he would be paid £12,000 per annum.
But the MP told the Commissioner that he decided in May or June 2020 that he would not invoice for payments under the contract.
The report says Mr Bridgen registered the role as a “Director” of Mere Plantations, to be paid £12,000 per annum on 17 June 2020; corrected the entry to state that he was an adviser, rather than a director, on 22 December 2020; and further amended the entry to state that the role was unpaid on 17 November 2021. It adds that the Commissioner has stated that the evidence demonstrates that Mr Bridgen has not received any payment from Mere Plantations for this role.
Following the investigation by Ms Stone, the committee concluded Mr Bridgen should have told ministers and officials he received a donation and a funded visit to Ghana from Mere and had a £12,000 contract to be an adviser.
Although Mr Bridgen claimed he was not paid any money by Mere Plantations and insisted any work on the firm’s behalf was covered by his “constituency” responsibilities as an MP, the commissioner concluded he had broken paragraphs 12 and 14 of the MPs’ code relating to declaring interests and paid advocacy.
The watchdog added: “I am of the view that Mr Bridgen showed a cavalier approach to the rules and had very limited knowledge of what the rules are and how they should be applied.”
The report also detailed how Mr Bridgen had committed a “significant litany of errors” by failing to declare his interests in Mere in eight emails to ministers, and in five meetings with ministers or public officials including Farming Minister Mark Spencer and COP26 President Alok Sharma.
But it was his email to Ms Stone which led to some of the strongest criticism of Mr Bridgen. In the email on 1 August 2022, he questioned whether his reputation as an outspoken critic of then-prime minister Mr Johnson could have influenced her findings.
The MP wrote: "I was distressed to hear on a number of occasions an unsubstantiated rumour that your contract as Parliamentary Standards Commissioner is due to end in the coming months and that there are advanced plans to offer you a peerage, potentially as soon as the Prime Minister's resignation honours list.
"There is also some suggestion amongst colleagues that those plans are dependent upon arriving at the 'right' outcomes when conducting parliamentary standards investigations.
"Clearly my own travails with Number 10 and the former PM have been well documented and obviously a small part of me is naturally concerned to hear such rumours.
"More importantly however you are rightfully renowned for your integrity and decency and no doubt such rumours are only designed to harm your reputation."
Mr Bridgen, who believed the charges against him were “politically motivated”, claimed he had written the email in an effort to obtain reassurance that the rumours he had heard about Ms Stone were not true.
But the Standards Committee said Mr Bridgen's email "appears to be an attempt to place wholly inappropriate pressure on the commissioner" which is "completely unacceptable behaviour".
