Sir Gordon Stanley Downey (26 April 1928 – 12 April 2022)
was Britain's first
Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards
The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards is an officer of the British House of Commons. The work of the officer is overseen by the Commons Select Committee on Standards.
The current commissioner is Daniel Greenberg.
Duties
The commissio ...
.
The Office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards was set up by the
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 memb ...
in 1995 as a result of recommendations made by the
Committee on Standards in Public Life
The Committee on Standards in Public Life (CSPL) is an advisory non-departmental public body of the United Kingdom Government, established by John Major in 1994 to advise the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Prime Minister on ethical standard ...
. He resigned shortly after ''Trial by Conspiracy'' by J Boyd Hunt was published in 1998, casting doubt on his report about
Neil Hamilton and the
cash-for-questions affair
The cash-for-questions affair was a political scandal of the 1990s in the United Kingdom.
It began in October 1994 when ''The Guardian'' newspaper alleged that London's most successful parliamentary lobbyist, Ian Greer of Ian Greer Associates, ...
.
Downey was previously chairman of the investors' "watchdog", the Personal Investment Authority.
Downey died on 12 April 2022, at the age of 93.
References
1928 births
2022 deaths
Ombudsmen in the United Kingdom
Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath
Fellows of King's College London
{{UK-gov-bio-stub