Next week I will be presenting a Private Members’ Bill to Parliament. This is something I have not done before, having never been lucky in the annual ballot for Private Members’ Bills.

Under the so-called Ten Minute Rule I will speak for ten minutes (hence the name of the rule) at prime time and have my Bill join a queue of those already on the table.

My ‘Commission on the Compact Bill’ sounds esoteric but is important. In 2007 the government established the Compact Commission to promote effective partnerships between the central and local government and the voluntary sector.

Today the Commission’s Chair is appointed by Government but his fellow commissioners are not. The Commission has no legal obligation to report on its work. And whilst it can advise on good practice, it cannot hold partners to account where the Compact is not working.

My short Bill addresses these issues by putting the Commission on a statutory footing. The Bill has the support of key ministers, voluntary sector representatives, the Commission itself and a cross-party group of MPs.

It is a Bill whose time has come.

It seems everyone is talking about MPs’ expenses again. Those who gave more details or explanations to the authorities than they needed to, up to 5 years ago, are being pilloried. Claims which were never even paid are being held up as examples of bad practice. And the once proud Daily Telegraph has connived with criminals at the lowest levels of cheque book gutter journalism.

Changes in the rules are needed, everyone agrees. Some have been made and more are in the pipeline. The stories doing the rounds are in no way typical. But if the press does not want to talk about our policies, we must be getting them right. That is what really matters at this challenging time for the economy.