A Tory MP should be suspended from the Commons for suggesting the standards commissioner’s potential peerage depended on ruling against him over lobbying breaches, the Standards Committee has recommended
Andrew Bridgen should be suspended for five sitting days, the parliamentary committee that oversees the work of the standards commissioner said.
The committee found the MP had breached the Code of Conduct by making multiple approaches to ministers and public officials on behalf of Mere Plantations, a Cheshire-based teak reforestation company with forests in Ghana for which he was initially paid £12,000 a year as an adviser.
He failed to register his interest in the company in the time frame stipulated by the code, with the committee saying he had a “very cavalier” attitude to the rules.
The committee also found Mr Bridgen, the MP for North West Leicestershire since 2010, had attempted to improperly influence Standards Commissioner Kathryn Stone during her investigation…
