At last, some common sense from Strasbourg

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg receives little praise in these pages, but we must commend it on its latest judgment. It has rejected a petition from the retailer Sir Philip Green to rule that the rights of parliamentarians to say what they wish in the Commons or Lords should be curtailed.

It would have been a gross travesty had the court found in favour of Sir Philip. Such a judgment would no doubt have been rejected by MPs and peers. Parliamentary privilege is enshrined in the Bill of Rights and is guarded jealously. The ECHR said it would be “incompatible with the autonomy of the UK Parliament” to find for Sir Philip.

He had objected to being named in the House of Lords after The Telegraph carried a story about an unidentified businessman accused of sexual harassment and bullying. He was said to have paid off his alleged victims and required them to sign non-disclosure agreements. An injunction prevented the newspaper from naming him, but Lord Hain, the former Labour cabinet minister, did so under privilege.

Sir Philip maintained that where a court had passed such a “gagging order” on the media this should apply to Parliament as well. Lord Hain called the billionaire’s application “shameless” and given the controversy involving his former company’s pension scheme he would have been better off retiring to his Monaco home with a modicum of humility and silence.

The rights enjoyed by MPs and peers should not be misused but neither should the courts be complicit in keeping information that should be in the public domain a secret. Without these gagging orders this situation would not have arisen.