A war of words broke out in the House of Keys this morning between the Chief Minster and Ramsey MHK Lawrie Hooper.
Although the infamous ‘gaslighting’ phrase wasn’t thrown across the floor, Mr Hooper did request the Chief Minister Alfred Cannan MHK to withdraw “accusations”.
Mr Hooper asked the Chief Minister “whether non-compliance with the law is a breach of the Ministerial Code and what action he would take if a Minister failed to comply with the law in the exercise of their duties”.
Ministerial Code
Mr Hooper said that the Chief Minister was “obviously aware” of breaches of the ministerial code and breaches of the law.
Hooper added: “Seeing as my question and my supplementaries haven’t actually mentioned any particular breach, which means the Chief Minister is fully aware of the actions of the Minister for Health in acting unlawfully, which helpfully she’s admitted to.
“So we have a situation now where the Chief Minister is basically saying it is perfectly okay for ministers to act unlawfully, provided they say sorry and they’re not going to do it again. Is that the case that actually the ministerial code isn’t really worth the paper it’s written on.”
‘Hugely pedantic’
The Chief Minister responded saying: “That’s absolutely not the case.”
The Chief said that Mr Hooper “is hugely pedantic” and that he “didn’t notice him resigning when the ministerial when the law was breached”.
His statement was interrupted by Mr Hooper who called for a point of order.
Mr Hooper said: “I’d like the Chief Minister to withdraw that he is now accusing me, whilst the Minister of acting unlawfully.
“That is quite a serious accusation for the Chief Minister to make, and I’d like them to withdraw those remarks, please, unless, of course, he has evidence sufficient to support that claim and that statement.”
The Chief Minister responded by saying “the Honorable Member seems to be throwing around accusations about the Minister for Health, and throw around accusations about somebody else, but is not prepared to look at his own actions whilst he was a minister”.
Ministerial Code
In response to Hooper’s original question, the Chief Minister said: “Any evidence of material non compliance with the law at a department level for which the Minister is ultimately responsible may well be deemed to be a breach of the ministerial code, as I informed this house on the 30th of November 2021 an alleged breach of the ministerial code would then be considered on case by case.”
You can listen to the full exchange below:
