Statement by Derek Conway
The standards and privileges committee report has cleared me on three of the four complaints alleging breach of the rules of the house.
They accepted the commissioner's findings that there was a job for my son Henry to do, that he was able and qualified to do it and that he had (with independent and photographic evidence) been doing it.
The complaint is upheld with regard to the salary level paid to my son Henry over a period of 39 months from July 2001 and requires me to make a gross repayment of £3,757.83 to the house authorities, which I shall.
In his evidence to the committee, the director of resources (letter 9 April 2008) specifically states: "I should make clear that all payments to Henry Conway were within the rules set out in the Green Book."
Henry was employed on the lowest grade of researcher/parliamentary assistant and over the 39 months employed was, on average, at the mid-point pay scale within that grade; however, the committee considered that he should have been at the entry level with a 2% annual uplift for the duration of his employment.
The committee has applied a judgment on the guidance to members which requires costs to have been "necessarily incurred" and from the outset I have maintained that this is a subjective opinion, made with hindsight, and that I had complied with the rules which existed at the time.
The committee has within its power to reach such an opinion, therefore I have complied with its requirement to write to its chairman, Sir George Young, apologising for the breach of the "necessarily incurred" rule.