Harriet Harman MP, Leader of House of Commons

ANDREW MARR: Now then the Prime Minister gave a keynote speech at yesterday's Labour Party Conference, committing the party to press forward with changes to the Health Service, more academy schools, giving help to those, but only those who really deserve it.

His deputy leader, Leader of the House of Commons Harriet Harman joins us now from Birmingham.

Thank you for joining us Harriet Harman. Can I ask you first of all, a lot again in the media this week about MPs' expenses and MPs' pay.

Do you think your fellow Members of Parliament are able to agree a new settlement for their own pay and rations which is stringent enough to satisfy the public? HARRIET HARMAN: Well on pay we already decided in January and there was agreement, unanimous agreement in the House of Commons to a proposal that we shouldn't vote on our own pay any more.

I think that the public find it unacceptable to see MPs voting their own pay increases. So we decided in January that we wouldn't do it like that any more.

There are other parliamentary systems elsewhere in the world that have different arrangements for deciding the level of MPs' pay, and we set up a review under Sir John Baker who's going to report back and that's going to come back to the House of Commons in July.

So hopefully we will have voted on our pay for the last time. On the question of allowances, I think, and that's kind of office expenditure and MPs' staff expenditure. I think the first point to make is that it is very important that MPs can properly hold the government to account, and to do that they need a proper office once they're elected. But obviously the public need to be absolutely sure that there is a proper system for validating claims and there's not abuse.

And I think that we were all horrified by the case of the Conservative MP Derek Conway because not only was it absolutely wrong, but it actually cast a shadow over all MPs, and I think all MPs are really dismayed by that. And we will come back in July after there's been a thorough review, and not only have root and branch discussion about what the allowances should be, but also how they're going to be properly and independently validated.

ANDREW MARR: And do you think those allowances should be open to public scrutiny? All the details of expenses before 2005 we read have been shredded, do you think that what MPs spend on taxis, meals, and so on, should be something that their constituents are able to read about?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well the Freedom of Information Act applies to the information held by the Parliament, the House of Commons authorities, in the same way that it applies to everyone else. And of course Parliament should comply with the Freedom of Information Act which actually it was Labour government that introduced.

I think there are some issues around personal privacy of, say, family members of MPs which will have to be sorted through. But there's a legal regime which applies to it with the Information Commissioner and the Information Tribunal. And if it's public money I think by and large the public want to know how public money is being spent, and they want to know it's spent properly.

But, you know, I think that everybody feels really, as I say, dismayed that the case of real abuse from Derek Conway has cast a shadow over, an unwarranted shadow, over the parliamentary system. But we will be looking root and branch reviewing this, and sorting it all out by the time the House finishes for the summer recess.

ANDREW MARR: I mean it isn't just Derek Conway of course, there's plenty of people on your side of the House who've had trouble. You're under, still, investigation by the electoral commission, I think, over your deputy leadership campaign. And then there's the Speaker himself who is in charge of all of this process and has been criticised as well?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well, as far as the Speaker is concerned, I mean, you know, people have made allegations but there's no facts that have been put forward there, and I think that that, you know, is wrong, people shouldn't just throw allegations wildly.

As far as my own situation is concerned, and my deputy leadership campaign, my, the way I raised the finance for my deputy leadership campaign was completely open, and the public could always see how the campaign funds were raised. I mean one of the things that I think that we should do in internal Labour Party elections in the future, the same as we should do for general elections, is I think we need a cap on spending.

I think political competitions whether they're in the Labour Party or whether they're in elections, ought to be won on the basis of the argument, not on the basis of how much money is raised. And I did propose at the outset of the deputy leadership election that there should be a cap on spending, it wasn't accepted at the time, but now I'm deputy leader I'm going to make sure that happens.

ANDREW MARR: So there will be a cap on spending because Peter Hain lost his job over this, in the government.

You were accused of breaking the rules and so on, there is clearly a corrosive problem that just carries on, month by month, you know there's always another story, isn't there, about MPs and their money?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well that's why I think that the root and branch review that's being done on MPs' allowances is important and we will come back to the House of Commons in July.

But as far as my position, Andrew, is concerned, you know let's not be in any doubt about this, you know, the money that I raised was very completely open and transparent and so, you know, there's no question of any shadow hanging over how I got elected to be deputy leader.

ANDREW MARR: Right, you've got a conference carrying on behind you, at a time when the Labour Party is in some trouble in the polls, the Prime Minister's given his speech, you've got your own proposals I think to help carers.

How difficult is it going to be to grab the public's attention again, and try to convince them that you're a government that's going forward rather than sort of wallowing?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well I think what we're doing, and we've got over the course of this weekend we've had more than 2,000 people from all around the country, Scotland, England and Wales, and I think what we've been doing is listening to the concerns that there are in local communities that families have got, and actually leading the way forward. And one of the real focuses has been on families this weekend.

And of course we're all familiar with the work that Labour's led to try and deal with the situation where the working, the stay-at-home mum, has to a large extent become a working mum, and making sure that there's more flexible working and longer maternity leave, and better support for mothers who are going out to work as well as having their childcare responsibilities.

But we're also looking ahead to the growing phenomenon just as the stay-at-home mum has become the working mum, the stay-at-home daughter who used to care for elderly relatives has now become the working daughter. So how do we support families when they're doing that very important work of caring for older relatives?

So there's a lot of discussion about respite care, about how we make sure people don't have to have a choice of caring for older relatives and having to throw in their job. How we have really much better support for families which are multi-generational. We've been talking about a multicultural society here, but we're also talking about a multi-generational society. So, because there are still problems that need to be addressed, we're still having ideas of how to meet those problems.

ANDREW MARR: And the Prime Minister's own mood and demeanour at the moment?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well I think that Gordon is very purposeful and, you know, very focussed on the task ahead. I mean one of the things that he's been talking about is how we make sure that the good economic growth that we've had over the last ten years is sustained against the background of globalised competition, particularly from China and India.

And he's focussed on the importance of everybody in this country having higher skills. You know we've got 600,000 job vacancies in our economy and what we must do is make sure that everybody has the opportunity to have as much education, as much skills, and that's what's going to make our, not only our society fairer, but our economy stronger in the future. So, I mean, once the job is done...

ANDREW MARR: Well, I was going to say, so you're moving forward, but is this a party now prepared to go for the long game, now expecting in the election sort of more or less at the last possible minute, you need a lot of time don't you, to start to turn this around?

HARRIET HARMAN: Well we're focussed on some really immediate at-hand elections, we've got elections on May 1st, in London, in the whole of Wales, and in councils in England. So there's been a lot of election campaign organisation going on at this conference.

With people going back to stand as county candidates in those council elections, so as far as the General Election is concerned, I mean we want to be getting on, we're in government, we want to be getting on and doing the job.

ANDREW MARR: All right, Harriet Harman, thank you very much indeed for joining me.

HARRIET HARMAN: Thank you.

INTERVIEW ENDS

Please note "The Andrew Marr Show" must be credited if any part of this transcript is used.

NB: This transcript was typed from a recording and not copied from an original script.

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