A Little Nepotism is a Good Thing

I met Sarah Brown once and, guess what, she really is as wonderful as everyone says.

I'd managed to wrangle an interview with the Prime Minister, but when I turned up at Downing Street he was busy at a reception with small business leaders which had overrun.

Mrs Brown, spotting me looking lost in a corridor and probably mistaking me for a respectable businessman, wandered over and told me the history of one of the paintings on the wall.

We generally accept the idea that the Prime Minister's spouse has a role to play hosting receptions and supporting charities, as long as they keep out of politics.

And lower down the pecking order, there's traditionally been a role for the wife or husband of the ordinary MP too.

It may seem a bit old-fashioned now, and its probably true only in a minority of cases, but sometimes when you vote for an MP you get two people instead of one.

This is why I think suggestions that MPs should be banned from employing relatives as assistants or secretaries are misguided.

Peter Luff (Con), MP for Mid Worcestershire, has warned that he would "seriously consider leaving the House" if he was barred from employing his wife, Julia.

In evidence to the Committee on Standards in Public Life, he claimed that she could do more to help his constituents than an ordinary secretary.

He said: "There is no doubt that my constituents feel they receive an excellent service from my office. They know that when they are talking to Mrs Luff (who answers the vast majority of calls to my office) they are talking to someone who speaks with the authority of the MP, they feel their confidences are genuinely secure and her personal and profession commitment to me is communicated in all her dealings with them."

I guess he means, to put it bluntly, that she can phone up the council and give them an earful on behalf of a constituent, with the full authority of the locally-elected MP, in a way no other secretary could.

The Committee is considering whether the rules should be changed to oblige every MP to advertise positions openly, and appoint people through a transparent process without favouring family members.

It sounds like a no-brainer. I imagine most people would instinctively say that staff should be appointed this way.

But would constituents really benefit? I don't think so.

• You can read all the evidence presented to the committee, including submissions from a number of MPs, here: http://www.public-standards.gov.uk/OurWork/MPs__Expenses___Evidence___Index.html