Tory MP ‘broke lobbying rules’ in pandemic

A SENIOR Tory MP has been referred to Parliament’s standards watchdog over claims he broke lobbying rules during the coronavirus pandemic.

Steve Brine, the chairman of the health and social care select committee, lobbied the chief executive of the NHS and ministers for a firm paying him £1,600 a month for “strategic advice”.

The Daily Telegraph’s Lockdown Files, a leaked cache of more than 100,000 pandemic-era Whatsapp messages, revealed that Mr Brine told Michael Gove in February 2021 he had been “trying for months” to convince the NHS to hire anaesthetists through Remedium, a recruitment firm. He said he had contacted Lord Stevens, then head of NHS England, and the Department of Health and Social Care.

Mr Brine’s declarations to the MPS’ Register of Financial Interests show he was paid £1,600 a month by Remedium between July 2020 and December 2021.

The parliamentary code of conduct says MPS cannot lobby ministers on behalf of organisations they have been paid by within six months.

The former health minister has now been referred to the parliamentary standards commissioner over the issue by Anneliese Dodds, the chairman of the Labour Party. Daniel Greenberg, the commissioner, will now decide whether to investigate the complaint.

If he concludes that Mr Brine has broken the code, the case will be referred to a committee of MPS to decide whether he should be sanctioned.

Sanctions could include suspending Mr Brine from the House of Commons for a fixed period of days, which could in turn trigger a by-election in his Winchester constituency.

Mr Brine told The Telegraph: “This was about responding [to] an urgent public call from ministers and the NHS in a national [crisis].”