Bullies like John Bercow thrive when we turn a blind eye

You could always spot them around Parliament — brisk walkers in a building full of power movers. Able to leave their desks, briefly, to grab a polystyrene lunch box before returning to their small office, where the boss would monitor them.

Working for an MP is an experience without parallel. Proximity to genuinely historic moments, and cost-price jerk chicken, are just two of the perks. But there is a darker side.

The power imbalances are stark. MPs are effectively heads of their own small businesses. Yet many have never managed a single member of staff before and struggle to work with often young, poorly paid colleagues. Some allow the power of being honourable members in the House and guests of honour in their constituencies to go to their heads. And a small but persistent minority are simply mean-spirited.

In 2018, an independent report by Dame Laura Cox concluded the Commons displayed a culture in which “bullying, harassment and sexual harassment have been able to thrive and have long been tolerated and concealed”.

Yesterday, an Independent Expert Panel review into the conduct of John Bercow found that the former speaker was a “serial bully” and a “serial liar”.

Some of the allegations against him were already in the public domain. For instance, those made by Angus Sinclair, a former naval captain and private secretary to two speakers. Sinclair was interviewed by BBC Newsnight in 2018, in which he accused Bercow of subjecting him to mimicry, foul language and attempts to physically intimidate him.

Yet that year, by three to two, the Committee on Standards voted that the Parliamentary Commissioner should not investigate. Sinclair went on to make seven complaints to the expert panel, four of which were upheld. So how did Bercow survive as speaker? Politics.

Principles are easy to stick to when the stakes are low. But when they are stratospheric — and pre-Covid, what could be higher than whether or not to hold an indicative vote on the UK’s membership of the customs union? — it is easy to ignore cruelty in favour of expediency.

Once a member of the Right-wing Monday Club, Bercow morphed into the bête noire of Tory governments, perceived to be sympathetic to Remainers. Debates over his suitability for office were relegated to another proxy battle in the Brexit war. Probity, and decency, were the fall guys.