Labour is ramping up plans to force another byelection ahead of a vote on Wednesday to suspend Peter Bone from parliament for six weeks.
Bone was stripped of the Conservative whip after being found by a watchdog to have bullied and harassed a member of staff and exposed his genitals near their face.
His suspension from parliament was recommended by an independent expert panel in their report and rubber stamped by the standards committee – but must be approved by the Commons to take effect.
Bone denies any wrongdoing and said in a statement last week that he would continue serving the people of Wellingborough, the Northamptonshire seat of which he has been MP since 2005 and which he won with a 19,000 majority at the last election.
The Guardian understands the vote to suspend him from parliament will be held on Wednesday, though there will be no debate.
Given the recommended suspension is longer than 10 days it would trigger a petition in his seat that, if signed by more than 10% of constituents in six weeks, would automatically lead to a byelection being called.
The motion is all but certain to pass, though allies of Bone suggested he has some sympathetic supporters.
Labour sources said they were already preparing to launch a campaign to encourage Wellingborough voters to sign the petition. “I wouldn’t be feeling comfortable if I were Peter Bone,” one said.
A Tory MP in a nearby seat said: “I would imagine they will get the [10%] target easily.”
It follows a successful bid by Scottish Labour to force a byelection in another seat where an MP was suspended for more than 10 days. In Rutherglen and Hamilton West, the former SNP politician Margaret Ferrier became the fourth MP to face recall after 15% of eligible constituents signed the petition, paving the way for a byelection that Labour won.
Bone has sought to remain active in his constituency since last week’s report. He shared a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, with a photo of himself canvassing with leaflets for a council candidate.
Tory MPs are braced for the vote on Wednesday, and know that abstaining or not voting could be used to attack them by opposition parties. There have been some notable absences on recent occasions, including Rishi Sunak, who declined to vote on a report that found Boris Johnson had committed five contempts of parliament.
Such issues are traditionally treated as a “free vote” – meaning party whips do not instruct MPs in their party which way to vote. The convention had a reprieve, however, when Johnson’s government whipped MPs to spare one of their own – Owen Paterson – from suspension after he was found to have broken lobbying rules.
In a separate development affecting parliament’s ethics watchdog, the Guardian understands that two Tory MPs are preparing to quit the standards committee.
Charles Walker and Andy Carter are planning to focus more on their backbench amibitions, with two coveted spots on the cross-party group that scrutinises allegations of MPs’ bad behaviour up for grabs.
news.sky.com
