Nolan Principles

Susan Murray Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Susan Murray (Mid Dunbartonshire) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Nolan principles.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee and the co-sponsors for bringing this important debate to the House. It is a pleasure to follow the debate on the battle of the Somme led by the hon. Member for South West Devon (Rebecca Smith). It reminds us of the sacrifices made by so many so that we can enjoy our way of life today, which we cannot take for granted, and which the Nolan principles help us to protect.

Recent polling has shown that just 9% of people trust politicians to put the interests of the nation above the interests of their own party, and recent British Election Study research found that around three quarters of people had low or no trust in MPs. Frankly, I am horrified that people might look at me in that way. For years, I operated in the community as a volunteer and activist, and later as a local councillor, and I was viewed in my community as a trustworthy source of support. Now I am proud to serve that community as the Member of Parliament. I know that most of my colleagues in this place and across public service are in it for the right reasons—to serve their constituents and communities.

More than 30 years ago, Lord Nolan set out seven simple principles that must be followed by people in public life: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership. The principles represent not just rules for us to follow, but an agreement and understanding between the public and those they trust to serve, represent and protect them.

We have all read about the headline-grabbing failures—partygate, when the rules our constituents followed were broken in Downing Street, or the questions over Peter Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador in Washington—but sometimes we do not know about the devastating consequences for our constituents when these principles are not followed. We do not always know how the pernicious creep of the ignoring and bending of the rules has reached into public bodies that people deal with every day: councils, the police and our schools.

In my Mid Dunbartonshire constituency and across Scotland, schools operate a software system called SEEMiS. Most hon. Members will not have heard of SEEMiS, but it is the system used by Scottish schools to keep pupil records—the formal records of a child’s education journey. Importantly, the records include notes on bullying incidents. Following a bullying incident in a school, a constituent told me about the difficulties they faced in trying to gain access to the data in their child’s record on SEEMiS. This resulted in a devastating breach of trust. After the incident badly affected the education journey of their child, they asked to access their child’s records. East Dunbartonshire council told them that the incident involving their child that they wished to view had been properly logged at the time, and that records could not be changed afterwards, but that was not the truth. My constituent was forced to go to court to access their child’s records, and only after a court ruling did the council hand them over.

This lack of transparency is deeply worrying, and the willingness of the council to spend taxpayers’ money on a court case, which it lost, shows little objectivity and poor accountability. To add to my constituent’s ordeal, they found not only that the notes were inaccurate, but that they had been altered. They did not find that out because they were told or because it was recorded in the notes; they had to access stored metadata—information that is not readily available and that requires a high level of technical expertise to access. When my constituent complained to the Information Commissioner’s Office, now the Information Commission, they were told that the actions of the school and the council did

“not meet with the obligation to be transparent”.

The ICO told the council that it should change the system so that notes cannot be backdated. The council has said that it has taken action, which I welcome, but the fact is that this happened and has had serious negative consequences for the child involved.

In focusing on the Nolan principles, I have necessarily concentrated on the accountability failures, rather than the full extent of what happened, as well as on how the case was handled by the council and the damage that that handling caused the young person. In another case, a child was the victim of a serious and very distressing incident caused by a fellow pupil. My constituent requested that safeguarding arrangements be put in place to protect their child, only for those arrangements to be removed without either my constituent or their child being consulted or informed. My constituent has spent years trying to establish who made those decisions, what assessments were carried out and what evidence justified them, but to no avail. She has often been told that past unanswered issues cannot be dealt with or has been given no answer at all. The impact on my constituent’s child and family has been enormous. This is not happening in isolation. This local authority, like others, has been subject to multiple findings that have identified failures and recurring concerns.

The Nolan principles speak of accountability, openness, honesty and leadership. That should mean answering reasonable questions honestly, explaining decisions and accepting responsibility when things go wrong. No parent should have to go to court to find out what has been written about their child. More than that, no parent should have to question whether the information they have been given is truthful. Openness, accountability and honesty should not be things that people have to fight for; they should be the foundations of our institutions. They need to be strengthened in our public bodies, and those in leadership roles should understand their responsibility. That is what it means for the Nolan principles to be at the core of public life. In these cases, they were not.

The SEEMiS case is of particular importance. It relates to the Nolan principles at every level. The council is responsible for SEEMiS software and decides how schools use it. The Scottish Government are responsible for the system that Scottish children are educated in, and Westminster is responsible for the data protection laws that govern the records. The Nolan principles can sound abstract, but these cases show why they matter, just as the lives of young people matter. When the principles were not followed, young people were let down and the community’s trust in our institutions was damaged.

Rarely do I speak about trust in politicians without mentioning the failures of the Scottish National party. As we all know, its record is far from clean. In June, the former chief executive of the SNP was jailed for embezzling more than £400,000 from his own party. A party let down on that scale should have welcomed scrutiny and made sure it could never happen again. That would help to rebuild trust and faith in politics. Instead, when MPs proposed that the Scottish Affairs Committee, on which I sit, look at the matter, the SNP’s Westminster leader, the hon. Member for Angus and Perthshire Glens (Dave Doogan), called it

“an unprecedented abuse of the House of Commons Committee system”.

What does that tell the people of Scotland about the openness, honesty and leadership of those who govern them?

I have three asks of the Government. First, every public body that holds records on people should be expected to keep a full and transparent trail of what is recorded and what was changed in those records, and when. There must be meaningful accountability when they fail to do so. Secondly, political parties should be held to the standard we expect of public bodies. Peter Murrell took more than £400,000 from his own party over 12 years, using his position to get around the party’s checks. If that can happen, the checks on how parties handle their money are not strong enough. Will the Government give the Electoral Commission stronger powers and, more importantly, the ability to issue higher fines to ensure that when questions arise, parties investigate themselves properly?

Finally, the standards system here at Westminster should set an example for every other institution to follow. The Government have strengthened the powers of the independent adviser, which is a good first step, but I would like to see the role put on a statutory basis with the power to open investigations, decide whether the ministerial code has been broken and publish what it finds. If we want to restore faith not just in politics, but in wider public life, the public need to be able to see that public bodies, MPs and political parties are held to account when they break the public’s trust.

[Chris Vince (Harlow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Susan Murray]

I have just finished my speech, actually.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

With a five-minute time limit, I call Sam Rushworth.

--- Later in debate ---

[Susan Murray]

I thank everyone who took part in the debate for their speeches and interventions and the Minister for her replies.

The Nolan principles are raised regularly in this House by Members, and rightly so. Although we hear concerns, as we have today, that the erosion of standards risks widening the chasm between the public and our institutions and politics, I am heartened to hear that the seven Nolan principles are valued and that their importance is acknowledged. They are as meaningful today as they were 30 years ago, forming a contract between every holder of public office and the British public. Perhaps rules should not be the culture, but they should influence and guide the culture, and the system should be fair and reasonable, based on principles and transparency.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the Nolan principles.

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