Anti-corruption experts have warned reforms that underpin the creation of the new Ethics and Integrity Commission do not go far enough to guarantee the watchdog’s effectiveness.
The EIC went live yesterday, taking on the previous remit of the Committee on Standards in Public Life and additional roles. It is chaired by Doug Chalmers, who formerly led CSPL. The move is part of a wider shakeup of the standards system that includes the abolition of anti-corruption panel the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments and changes to the ministerial code.
Establishing the EIC was a Labour Party manifesto pledge in last year’s general election. Despite welcoming the commission’s creation, senior figures in Unlock Democracy, Transparency International UK, and Spotlight on Corruption questioned whether it has the necessary funding and levers.
In a joint statement, Unlock Democracy director Tom Brake, Transparency International UK policy and programmes director Duncan Hames, and Spotlight on Corruption director Sue Hawley, said further work is required to make EIC fit for its intended purpose. The statement was also signed by the UK Anti-Corruption Coalition, a network of the UK’s leading anti-corruption organisations.
“We welcome the visible role the EIC looks set to play in building public awareness and confidence in the standards regime,” they said. “Yet the government’s willingness to empower and resource the EIC remains uncertain.
“On this hangs the watchdog’s credibility and effectiveness. Without sufficient backing, the EIC will be too open to the whims of a future government, and even potential abolition.”
Brake, Hames and Hawley said that while the EIC’s remit was “clear enough”, it was not evident that the watchdog would have sufficient powers to “promote accountability, transparency and a culture of integrity across government”. They said EIC should be placed on a statutory footing, but that there is no indication from ministers this will happen.
They said that to be fully independent, EIC should be free of government influence and would, ideally, come under direct parliamentary oversight.
Brake, Hames and Hawley said ministers’ decision to give the Cabinet Office authority to set the EIC’s budget left the commission “vulnerable to political pressure” and the possibility of being completely undermined. They said MPs on parliament’s Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee would have been the more appropriate body to take on responsibility for the committee.
They concluded: “As it stands, the EIC does not live up to its billing, and is far from a panacea for rebuilding public confidence in the integrity of those in public office. Rather, it risks looking like a cosmetic rebrand of a flawed standards regime, well short of the reset required.”
EIC tasked with producing ‘duty of candour’ guidance
In a statement to parliament marking the launch of the commission, Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds said the EIC would “play a leading role” in supporting public bodies to create their own codes of ethical conduct.
That is a new requirement under the Public Office (Accountability) Bill – to be known as the Hillsborough Law – which also includes a “duty of candour” for public servants.
"The prime minister has commissioned the EIC to report on how public bodies can develop, distribute and enforce codes so that they effect meaningful cultural change, ensuring public officials act with honesty, integrity and candour at all times,” Thomas-Symonds said.
“On the publication of its report, and on the Hillsborough Law receiving royal assent, the EIC will act as a ‘centre of excellence’ on public sector codes of conduct, providing guidance and best practice to help all public bodies put ethics and integrity at the heart of public service delivery.”
The Commission will also report annually to PM Keir Starmer on the overall health of the nation’s standards system.
A letter from Starmer to EIC chair Chalmers published yesterday stresses the commission’s ongoing role in continuing CSPL’s work as custodian of the seven principles of public life. Those principles stemmed from CSPL’s original inquiry into early-1990s sleaze and corruption in parliament and government.
Starmer said the EIC’s terms of reference would empower it to “convene leaders of standards bodies in government and parliament to identify areas of common concern, and engage and inform the wider public on the values, rules and oversight mechanisms that govern standards in public life”.
The PM said EIC’s first piece of work should be reporting on how public bodies can “develop, distribute and enforce such codes so that they effect meaningful cultural change, ensuring public officials act with honesty, integrity and candour at all times”.
EIC chair Chalmers said work would start on the report “as soon as the commission has the resources to do so”.
He added: “Thank you for your confidence in my leadership. I am committed to ensuring that the Ethics and Integrity Commission, like its predecessor, the Committee on Standards in Public Life, plays a meaningful and lasting role in strengthening ethical standards across British public life.”
Ministerial code changes
Updates to the ministerial code published yesterday, to coincide with the launch of the EIC and the abolition of Acoba, include measures to tighten the rules on ministers’ ability to pocket severance pay and a new .
Ministers who leave office are entitled to severance pay of one-quarter of their ministerial salary, worth around £17,000 for a cabinet minister.
Under changes introduced in the update, ministers will be expected to forgo their severance if they leave office having served less than six months, or if they leave office following a serious breach of the ministerial code.
The revised code also states that if a former minister is re-appointed to a ministerial office within three months of leaving, they will be expected to waive their salary for the period that overlaps with their severance payment.
Elsewhere the latest incarnation of the ministerial code reflects changes to the business appointment rules that allow the prime minister to ask former ministers to repay their severance lump sum if they are found to have breached the rules with a post-government job.
Another change to the code is the stipulation that a Cabinet Office minister must be consulted before a department seeks the prime minister’s agreement to set up a public inquiry, and on its terms of reference. Thomas-Symonds said this changed aims to "ensure decisions are well judged and proportionate, and that inquiries focus on finding the right answers and help effect change".