At a vote in the House of Commons today, 3 Somerset MPs lined up to protect a colleague from suspension. Owen Paterson is not unknown to residents of Somerset. He was Secretary of State for the Environment during the Somerset floods. Today his behaviour in Parliament was under scrutiny.

Paterson was found to have breached the Parliamentary rules on lobbying by the Standards Committee. This should ordinarily have resulted in his being suspended from the House. He was found to have breached lobbying rules during meetings/discussions with the Food Standards Agency. At the time he was being paid more than £100,000 by two companies; Randox and Lynn’s Country Foods.

However an amendment was proposed by Conservative MP Andrea Leadsome. This asked MPs not just to reprieve Paterson, but to change the rules which he was said to have breached.

The vote on the Committee of Standards Amendment (a) (Leadome’s amendment) was passed. As a result Paterson will not be suspended. The closeness of the vote reflects a degree of discomfort at what many see as a bending of the rules. 98 Conservative MPs refused to vote with the government, while 13 actually voted against the government.

Overall MPs voted by 250 to 232 to accept Leadsome’s amendment.

Somerset MPs David Warburton, Marcus Fysh and Rebecca Pow all voted in favour of Paterson. However Messrs Heappey and Liddell Grainger both failed to record a vote with the government.

Sean Dromgoole, parliamentary spokesperson for Somerton and Frome Labour, said: “If you or I were found to have done something wrong, we’d expect to face the consequences. But this vote proves that if you’re a Conservative MP you just tear up the rules to let yourself off. By voting for it David Warburton has shown he believes different rules apply to him and his mates than the rest of us.”