Owen Paterson must regret his appeal to the European Court of Human Rights

The European Court of Human Rights has dismissed an application by former cabinet minister Owen Paterson. The former Conservative MP, accused of breaching lobbying rules, sued the government to have a 2021 parliamentary inquiry into his conduct declared unfair. That Paterson brought the case to the Strasbourg court in the first place could be seen as a remarkable display of chutzpah (or perhaps just hypocrisy) given that he had previously campaigned for the UK to leave the ECHR, before his own personal tribulations.

Paterson’s complaint to the European Court of Human Rights was always something of a pipe dream. Under Boris Johnson, an investigation by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards was launched following reports that Paterson had lobbied for two companies for which he was a paid consultant. The Commissioner concluded that he had breached the Members’ Code of Conduct and that his failings were both serious and numerous.

Paterson's application to the European Court of Human Rights was always rather chimerical

The House of Commons Standards Committee agreed with the Commissioner's findings. determined Paterson's actions constituted a blatant case of paid advocacy, which caused significant harm to the reputation and integrity of the House of Commons. The Committee recommends that he be suspended from the House for 30 sitting days.

Paterson was outraged by the outcome, saying the process he was subjected to failed to comply with natural justice.

Following the Committee's decision, in a hugely controversial move (which probably contributed to Boris Johnson's ultimate downfall), the government attempted to delay consideration of the proposed suspension by the House of Commons, presumably on the grounds that a vote to sanction Paterson in this way would trigger a recall petition.

The government instead sought to appoint a special committee to examine whether Paterson's case (and the standards system) should be re-examined. Despite securing a vote on this bizarre proposal, the manoeuvre ultimately failed. No opposition member would sit on the committee. A new vote was scheduled on the proposed motion to sanction Paterson. This ultimately led to resign as a member of parliament.

But Paterson then argued that the finding that he had breached the code of conduct had damaged his reputation and that the process of investigating and reviewing the allegations against him had been unfair in a number of fundamental respects. He added that this amounted to a breach of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (right to private and family life).

Paterson said that as a result of proceedings before the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards and the Standards Committee he had been unable to find paid employment and had been ostracised by people he thought were his friends. In a rather tragic plea he argued that he had been unable to attend events, noting that on the occasion of the coronation of King Charles III he had not attended any events for fear of embarrassing his hosts.

Paterson was not allowed to launch an internal appeal against the Standards Committee's findings because of Article IX of the Bill of Rights 1689 (which states that parliamentary proceedings are not to be challenged or questioned in any court outside Parliament and is underpinned by the principle of the separation of powers).

Instead, Paterson went to Europe: the Strasbourg Court does not consider itself bound by such provisions of domestic law and therefore examined the merits of Paterson's claims. These proved unconvincing.

The Court held that Paterson's application was inadmissible. Even if there had been an infringement of his Convention rights, the Court considered that this infringement was accompanied by adequate procedural safeguards and proportionate to the legitimate aims pursued by the State.

The court nevertheless conducted a detailed and rather damning assessment of Paterson's arguments. It noted that the allegations against Paterson were already in the public domain before the Standards Commissioner began his investigation. It also found that Paterson had failed to substantiate his more specific allegations about the harm caused to his professional relationships and the resulting financial loss.

It is significant that the inquiry found that the MP had resigned before the inquiry could determine whether or not to apply the recommended sanction. It considered that, therefore, neither the loss of his seat nor the loss of income from his position as an MP was a necessary consequence of the inquiry.

The court concluded that even if there had been an interference with Paterson's rights under the ECHR, it would nevertheless have found his claim to be manifestly unfounded.

Parliament’s authorities will be delighted that the Strasbourg court has dealt so swiftly with the challenge to its procedures. Keir Starmer may also welcome this diversion from the (admittedly more minor) corruption charges against his administration. In the meantime, one can imagine that Paterson’s views on the merits of the ECHR remain unchanged.