The Charity Commission has apologised “unreservedly” after the Committee of Privileges found that it committed a contempt of parliament by seeking to block special reports from being laid before MPs.
The regulator was referred to the committee after it sought a judicial review in September last year against the Parliamentary Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO).
While the judicial review was ultimately denied permission to proceed, the PHSO accused the commission of trying to prevent it from laying critical reports before parliament, which the charity regulator initially denied.
In its reports, the PHSO criticised the commission’s implementation of its previous recommendations regarding sexual abuse inquiries at two charities – one regarding the experiences of a woman named Lara Hall and another about a man named Damian Murray.
The commission’s judicial review claim had questioned the PHSO’s authority to make such recommendations as an ombudsman, and the regulator’s power to implement them.
This week, the privileges committee concluded: “It could not be clearer that the Charity Commission sought to prevent or delay the laying of special reports in relation to [Hall] and [Murray] before parliament in which the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration (PCA) set out what she considers to be remaining and unremediated injustice.
“In short, a non-ministerial government department has sought to prevent parliament from receiving reports that criticise its behaviour.”
The committee recommended in its report on the matter that the commission's chief executive, David Holdsworth, apologise to House of Commons for denying that the legal action was intended to stop the reports being laid.
It described the “obstruction of provision of information to parliament” as “wholly unacceptable”, and recommended that Holdsworth apologise to parliament “for saying that the commission’s legal action was not intended to quash the laying of the reports when that was precisely its purpose”.
The committee also recommended that the commission's board, which supported the legal action, should accept responsibility and apologise to parliament.
Commission’s chair accepts findings
In response to the report, Julia Unwin, chair of the Charity Commission, said: “We accept the committee's report in full and apologise unreservedly.
“We should not, in hindsight, have persisted in challenging through the courts the laying of the two reports before parliament,” she said.
“We regret those decisions and are taking time to carefully review the committee’s report and consider the lessons we need to learn.
“We anticipate that parliament will formally debate the committee’s report in due course, but in the meantime we – the board and chief executive – will be making immediate apologies to the house.”
Hall, one of the two victims, said she was “delighted” with the privileges committee’s report and that the money the commision spent on the judicial review “should have been spent protecting vulnerable people like myself, Mr Murray, and many others from abuse”.
