Labour MPs to face questions on interests

WES STREETING and Jess Phillips are among a group of Labour politicians facing questions about whether they correctly registered their interests as directors of a fund that gives money to the party.

The two front-bench MPs are directors of the Lionel Cooke Memorial Fund, as are the Labour peers Lord Falconer and Lord Sawyer.

However, the four have not included the directorships – which are unpaid – in their parliamentary registers of interests, even though three other Labour peers, who are also directors, felt it necessary to do so.

The rules on recording interests are set out in a code of conduct for members of the Lords, and a separate code for MPs.

The Lords code says: “Certain non-financial interests may reasonably be thought to affect the way members of the House of Lords discharge their public duties and must therefore be registered”.

The code lists a range of non-financial interests that are “always relevant and therefore must be registered”, including “unremunerated directorships”.

The code for the Commons says MPs “must register… any other interest, if the member considers it might be thought by others to influence his or her actions as a member in the same way as a financial interest”, which “might include an unpaid directorship”.

A Conservative source said: “Why are senior Labour politicians not declaring their roles in a Labour donating fund, when their parliamentary peers have?”

A Labour source said that Mr Streeting and Ms Phillips had followed the rules.

Lord Falconer and Lord Sawyer both admitted they had made a mistake in not disclosing their positions and would be correcting it.