MPs should stop worrying about trivialities like ‘upskirting’ laws when women are still being harassed and silenced within parliament

MPs love to flaunt their feminist credentials, as long as they don’t apply to a young female researcher someone has hit on, which might require an expensive non-disclosure agreement to tidy up

The House of Commons regularly uses controversial gagging orders to prevent former staff speaking out about their treatment in the workplace (PA)

You might find it strange that the home of free speech has spent £2.4m silencing disgruntled former employees. Over the past five years, 53 parliamentary workers have received thousands of pounds of public money in payoffs, conditional on secrecy.

The same politicians who want better protection for whistleblowers, and greater transparency in the NHS, are going to inordinate lengths (and considerable cost) to keep poor treatment of their own staff hidden from public scrutiny.

Parliamentary privilege allows MPs to stand up in the debating chamber and make allegations about unacceptable behaviour without fear of being sued for libel – but the House of Commons regularly uses controversial gagging orders to prevent former staff speaking out about their own treatment in the workplace, in the offices and corridors of Westminster.

Non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) have been widely criticised in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal. They close down criticism and allow sexual predators and bullies to continue to prey on new victims without the oxygen of publicity. For years now, male-dominated professions like the police, the fire brigade and financial institutions have used NDAs whenever high ranking females seek compensation at employment tribunals alleging bullying or discrimination. NDAs of this type should be banned – they have no place in modern society and prevent the natural evolution of equal and fair treatment for all.

There have been dozens of allegations about unacceptable behaviour in Westminster, where around 2,500 (mainly young) people work in low-paid jobs, usually as researchers and assistants to MPs. Their employers are usually white, male and middle-aged to elderly, with wives and partners living many miles away in their constituencies. Allegations of impropriety range from bullying and casual groping to aggressive sexual advances, and relate to people at the highest levels of authority, the speaker included.

Although parliament is drawing up a new code of conduct for staff, most are employed and paid for by MPs, and find it difficult to complain without fear of losing their job. How will that change? Will one contract apply to every member of staff, with the same rate of pay and conditions? Of course not, plus the new code of conduct and complaints procedure will not apply to historic grievances.

Not all the Westminster NDAs over the past few years apply to women. The speaker John Bercow has had a difficult relationship with many of his staff and one of his former private secretaries Angus Sinclair has accused him of bullying.

Another apparent contradiction is the House’s ongoing concern about women’s rights – am I the only person who finds the obsession with ‘upskirting’ a waste of parliamentary time? In a week when they could have been legalising medicinal cannabis without delay and MPs could have sacked “failing Grayling” as our rail network is still in chaos (he survived a no confidence motion by just 20 votes), they chose to introduce legislation making it illegal to take photos up a woman’s skirt (or a man’s kilt) without permission. The original private member’s bill was talked out by a single (male) MP the other week.

MPs love to flaunt their feminist credentials, as long as they don’t apply to a young female researcher someone has hit on, which might require a NDA to tidy up. Upskirting is a nuisance, it is abhorrent, but is it really such a problem requiring a new law, when legislation covering public decency already exists?

Female MPs are routinely subjected to revolting trolling and hate mail (Birmingham Yardley MP Jess Phillips said recently she received 600 rape threats in one night), but there’s no need to pile new laws onto the statute book because the police do not have the manpower or the expertise to shut this down.

Any high profile woman will be experiencing similar levels of abuse and the solution is simple – come off social media and stop pretending that Twitter is the best way to run a democracy and conduct reasoned and constructive debate.

One Labour MP wants the proposed law on upskirting to be extended to make misogyny a hate crime. Campaigners also want the creation of fake pornographic images using real photographs to be classified as a crime. While I accept that modern technology allows perverts to attack their victims in a whole host of new and insidious ways, are we not getting bogged down in detail? And how would the police enforce all these new laws, given that they are patently not up to speed on the use of mobile phone records as vital evidence in criminal trials involving sex crimes?

As for the fake feminists in government, culture secretary Matt Hancock says it’s “about time” a woman hosted Question Time. But isn’t it “about time” we had female parity in the cabinet, a female speaker, and acceptable working conditions for young women in Westminster?

As someone who regularly appears on Question Time (and will be in Exeter next week) the best person to host the show would be anyone capable of forcing MPs to speak English, not power point jargon. Any host who can get panellists to stick to a point and keep their contribution short. They can be male, female or gender-fluid, what’s required is a very tall order – and such a person may not even exist.