Ex-MP ‘showed blatant disregard for rules’ in failing to register defence job

A former Tory MP should be stripped of his right to access the parliamentary estate after showing “blatant disregard” in failing to register his employment by a defence company for two years, the Commons Standards Committee said.

Bob Stewart, who stood down as MP for Beckenham at the election, failed to register his employment as a consultant with Ksantex, a firm registered in Luxembourg but owned by Azerbaijan-born French citizen Khagani Bashirov, according to the committee.

Were he still an MP, he would also be subject to a 10-day suspension from the Commons, enough to kick-start the process that could pave the way for a by-election.

£70,000

The former Army officer was employed by Ksantex between 2015 and 2017, and was paid more than £70,000 over that period.

He referred himself to Parliament’s standards authority after media reporting suggested the job could conflict with his role as a member of the Commons Defence Committee.

In his initial defence, Mr Stewart said he had registered a role with a company he called VES Consultancy several years previously, which was part of the “same group of companies” as Ksantex.

Parliament’s standards commissioner found the registry for VES Consultancy was incorrect, that the company was actually called Vnesh Expert Services, and that Mr Stewart did not register all his earnings from the role he undertook there.

The commissioner also found Mr Stewart failed to register his role with Ksantex, and payments from the company worth £32,277.87 in 2015, and £41,385.20 in 2017.

After examining the findings of the commissioner, the standards committee said Mr Stewart should have declared his role with Ksantex as it “could have reasonably been inferred to be a defence-related company for at least some of the time” during which he worked for it.

Complex

The investigation was “lengthy and complex”, the standards committee said, owing to “contradictory evidence” given by Mr Stewart throughout, though it noted the ex-MP had shown remorse for his failures to accurately register the job.

In its conclusion, the committee said: “For a senior Member to commit several breaches, spanning three codes of conduct and a period of 14 years, shows a blatant disregard for the rules.

“It is integral to the transparency of the standards system that Members accurately register their outside interests and make declarations in relevant proceedings. Nor are minor sums involved in these repeated breaches: payments of £41,385.20 and £32,277.87, for example, went entirely unregistered.”

The committee recommended Mr Stewart’s parliamentary pass – which allows long-serving ex-MPs to enter the Westminster estate – be “revoked with effect from the rising of the House for its Christmas recess”.

Suspended

It also said if he were still an MP, they would recommend he “apologise on the floor of the House and be suspended from the service of the House for a period of no fewer than 10 sitting days”.

A 10-day suspension is the threshold for triggering a recall petition, a process where voters can call for a by-election of a censured MP.

Mr Stewart was contacted for comment.

Elsewhere, the standards commissioner has opened an investigation into Conservative former minister Sir Geoffrey Cox, over late registration of interests.

Sir Geoffrey was in 2016 found to have breached House of Commons rules by making a late registration of his outside earnings as a barrister.

He has faced criticism for spending time on his legal work outside of Parliament, including acting as a lawyer in the British Virgin Islands in 2021 while Parliament was sitting.