1922 Committee

In British politics the Conservative Private Members' Committee (known informally as the 1922 Committee) is a body of Conservative Members of Parliament (MPs). Executive membership and officers are by consensus limited to backbench MPs, although since 2010 frontbench Conservative MPs have an open invitation to attend meetings. The committee meets every week while the UK parliament is in session, and provides a way for Conservative backbenchers to coordinate and discuss their views based on their constituents' and personal views, independently of frontbenchers. The committee can also have an important role in choosing the party leader.

Committee constitutional matters

The 1922 Committee has an 18-member executive committee, the chairman of which must oversee any election of a new party leader, or any Conservative party-led vote of confidence in respect of the current one; such a vote can be triggered by 15 percent of Conservative MPs writing a letter to the chairman asking for such a vote. This process was invoked most recently on 28 October 2003, when 25 MPs requested a vote of confidence in Iain Duncan Smith by writing to the chairman, then Michael Spicer. Duncan Smith lost the vote the next day.

Origins

The committee was formed in 1923 but takes its name from the 1922 general election. The name does not stem from a famous 19 October 1922 meeting at the Carlton Club in which Conservative MPs successfully demanded that the party withdraw from the coalition government of David Lloyd George. The resolution passed at that meeting triggered the general election which the Conservative Party won — the many new Conservative MPs elected for the first time formed the Conservative Private Members' Committee to discuss and influence political events.

The MPs who founded the Committee were not the same as those who had taken the decision to end the 1916-22 Coalition government. It began as a small dining group of new members in 1922, then moved on to be a ginger group of active backbenchers. After the 1923 and 1924 elections, the membership expanded as more new Conservative MPs were elected, and in 1926 all backbench MPs were invited to become members. Consequently, it became a platform for the majority rather than a focus for discontent.

2010 changes

On 19 May 2010, shortly after the Conservatives had formed a coalition government with the Liberal Democrats, Prime Minister David Cameron suggested altering the Committee to involve ministers (frontbenchers) in the recommendation forming process, angering some backbench MPs. On 20 May 2010, Committee members voted to approve the change, with 168 votes in favour and 118 against. Many backbench party members criticised the move and voted against it, while ministers had argued such a change would be necessary to continue operating coherently as a party during its membership of a coalition government.

However, under its new chairman Graham Brady, it was clarified shortly after that vote that frontbenchers are consequently able to attend meetings of the Committee whereas only backbenchers would be able to vote for its officers and executive committee.

Accordingly, the 1922 Committee now is open to all sitting Conservative members of the House of Commons, but although frontbenchers may attend, they cannot participate in elections, similarly to the Parliamentary Labour Party.

Recent media coverage

In July, 2011, after addressing the House of Commons in the wake of James and Rupert Murdoch's parliamentary testimony in the News International phone hacking scandal, Cameron was reported to have been received enthusiastically by the Committee, later that night. A second Guardian report on this supportive reception stated that "reporters ... outside" were a probably intended audience for the show and that Cameron's support amongst Tories was still at least to some degree shaken by the News International-related events. "Many [party members in Commons] complain," according to the reporter without naming names, "that they cannot use the 1922 Committee ... without being briefed against for doing so."

The Spectator on 20 December 2012 seemed to cast little doubt on backbenchers speaking their minds at meetings: at the party leader's end-of-year address to the Committee one MP freely said his party needed to learn a lesson from what had happened regarding Andrew Mitchell, other members in Committee meetings earlier in the year having "expressed concerns about Mitchell that contributed to his decision to resign."

Current members

As of 3 June 2015, the full 1922 committee membership comprised:

• Chairman
  • Graham Brady
• Vice chairmen
  • Cheryl Gillan
  • Charles Walker
• Secretaries
  • Bob Blackman
  • Nigel Evans
• Treasurer
  • Stewart Jackson
• Executive Members:
  • Steve Baker
  • Simon Burns
  • David Burrowes
  • James Cleverly
  • Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
  • Simon Hart
  • Bernard Jenkin
  • Jason McCartney
  • Karl McCartney
  • Antoinette Sandbach
  • Andrew Turner
  • Bill Wiggin

Former chairmen

• Sir Gervais Rentoul (1923–1932)
• William Morrison (1932–1935)
• Sir Hugh O'Neill, 1st Baronet (1935–1939)
• Patrick Spens (1939–1940)
• Sir Alexander Erskine-Hill (1940–1944)
• Sir John McEwen (1944–1945)
• Arnold Gridley (1946–1951)
• Derek Walker-Smith (1951–1955)
• John Morrison (1955–1964)
• Sir William Anstruther-Gray, 1st Baronet (1964–1966)
• Sir Arthur Vere-Harvey (1966–1970)
• Sir Harry Legge-Bourke (1970–1972)
• Sir Edward du Cann (1972–1984)
• Cranley Onslow (1984–1992)
• Sir Marcus Fox (1992–1997)
• Sir Archie Hamilton (1997–2001)
• Sir Michael Spicer (2001–2010)

Secretaries

• Sir Victor Goodhew (1979–1983)
• Dame Jill Knight (1983–1987)

Notes and references

Notes

References

External links

• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/a-z_of_parliament/82575.stm