Back in September the Labour Party Chief Whip Nick Brown MP was suspended from the Labour Party after an investigation was opened into his conduct. So what, you might say, people get suspended from political parties or lose the Parliamentary Whip on a regular basis. That is of course correct, parties have to maintain internal discipline and especially so in Parliament which leads to rebels or wrong ‘uns or those who fall out of favour with the leadership, losing the whip and or being suspended from the party.
It is often the case in my experience of observing Parliament that unless the person who has been suspended is the subject of a criminal inquiry, where the convention on not naming suspects until charged applies, information as to why the MP or Peer is suspended from a party or loses the party whip often leaks out or is made public by the party leadership. However in the case of Nick Brown, nothing about the complaint against him has either leaked out or been put in the public realm by the Labour Party leadership.
This strikes me as somewhat odd. There’s been no rumours about the complaint or complainant and I can’t find anything concrete on a search on the Guido Fawkes site which does have a reputation for reporting various Parliamentary rumours. Surely as Chief Whip Nick Brown must have made enough enemies in Parliament, all Whips do, to make at least some of those who are such enemies want to dish the dirt on him but nobody seems to have done so.
We are now approaching 120 days since Nick Brown was suspended but still there is a wall of silence about the reason why he was suspended. There’s no rumours as far as I can see circulating around and no word on the matter from Sir Keir Starmer and his team.
Now of course Mr Brown is entitled to be considered as innocent until proven otherwise but it’s interesting to compare his situation with those of Tory MP’s who have been suspected of wrongdoing or who have had allegations made against them. In a lot of cases information about these suspensions and whip removals come out pretty quickly. There is a whole list of them to be found online along with the reasons such as Matt Hancock being suspended from the party for abandoning his constituents to take part in ‘I’m a Celebrity…’ and Julian Knight who is currently being investigated by the Met Police over sexual assault allegations. We know all about most of the Tories who are currently suspended from the party or who have lost the Tory Whip, but we know absolutely sod all about the reasons behind Nick Brown’s suspension.
The silence on this issue is attracting both speculation and comment online with people starting to wonder exactly why there is such a solid wall of silence about this issue. People are starting to wonder whether the reason Brown has been suspended is because the suspension is in relation to something that is serious or criminal. On the other hand this might not be serious or criminal but could merely be a matter that could be very embarrassing for the party, maybe something financial or something that makes Labour look bad.
Whilst I can understand that a party leadership may want to protect or shield those members who are not yet proven by either an internal investigation or a criminal trial to be wrong ‘uns in the interests of justice, the silence here is not working in Labour’s favour. The length of time it is taking for information to come out about Nick Brown’s suspension is not making the party look good. In fact it’s making Labour look as if the party has something to hide and that is why they are being silent about the suspension of Nick Brown.
Maybe Labour should put the understandable desire to shield members who are under investigation from the glare of publicity to one side and tell us all why Nick Brown has been suspended. This is because the longer the silence the more widespread and lurid the rumours will become. It might be better to lance this boil now rather than let the current hillock of rumours turn into a mountain them. Sometime in politics honesty really is the better policy and this looks like one of those occasions.
