Is this going to be the final nail?
October 13th, 2009
And is it made worse by the decision on Jacqui?
Almost all the front pages this morning are devoted to the second eruption of the MPs expenses scandal and, in particular, the focus on Mr. Brown.
We wait to see whether the further inquiries of Cameron will produce bad headlines for him but for the moment the fact that the PM is going to have to pay a slab of money back is not going to help his chances of re-election.
All this has been made worse by the juxtaposition with the Jacqui Smith decision who yesterday apologised to the house but won’t have to pay anything back.
From a simple perspective does not that make Brown’s position even worse? For Jacqui bore the brunt of the first wave of this scandal and in straight monetary terms at least the comparison does not look good.
We’ll have to see how all this polls but my sense is that this is not good for Mr. Brown.
I’m extending my “sell” position in the SportingIndex “Gordon Brown days” market. This is currently pointing to a mid-March exit from Number 10 - I wonder whether this could bring it forward.
How he must rue the day that he decided to set up the Legg investigation for he has become a victim of his own strategy.
Mike Smithson
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There’s not much you can do to spin “ordered to repay 12k in wrongly claimed expenses”. So yes, it is another nail in the coffin, albeit I think most people are just waiting for Gordon to go, so it’s not as if there are many people for whom this will be the last straw.
“Is this going to be the final nail?”
I doubt it. Anyone still idiotic enough to support Brown isn’t doing it because they like him, they’re doing it because they fear the evil Tories even more. They fear for their cushy and unsustainable public sector jobs, their welfare benefits, their juicy public sector contracts, etc. Labour’s conscious attempt to create a massive client state has at least guaranteed them a corrupt hard core which are hardly going to be shocked by the notion that their leader is trousering the taxpayers’ money just as they are. After all, he wrote a guide about how to sponge off the welfare state when he was young - far worse in my view than being a member of a drinking club at university.
The idea that he would resign under a cloud is very unlikely. He could be forced out I suppose though I don’t see anyone with the wherewithal to do it. He’ll go if he doesn’t think he can win and we’re nowhere near that yet.
2 PSJ
Yes, everyone who supports Labour is “corrupt”.
“Corrupt” and “idiotic”.
Is that the line?
I think the biggest problem is that this crowds out other important issues. In some senses the election is going to be played through this prism but it shouldn’t be dominated by it. The government shouldn’t be defeated for this reason, and other parties voted for because they are cleaner. It was the system that was wrong and all MP’s have an equal stake in that.
I wouldn’t want a situation in the next election where a party is elected that is wrong on all the issues but somewhat clean or a party that is right on all the issues to be defeated because they are somewhat more culpable. Fortunately no party is entirely right on all the issues or entirely clean but the point stands.
The more I think about it the more hostages to fortune the Conservatives have left. They painted a picture of Britain that very few recognized. Their remedy of relentless pain was something you’d only accept if you accepted their premise and slogan ‘we’re all in it together’. A major tactical mistake. Voters won’t want to be there. They’ll look for an an exit.
Who’s that beautiful woman with the endearing smile pictured above? Is it Jacqui?
Betting on the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences
Elinor Ostrom and Oliver E. Williamson won.
And Ladbrokes had them both at… 50/1!
Did anybody here made a killing?
Mike, to answer your question - NO
I am actually quite shocked that you still seem to believe in the concept of ‘final nail’ for anything to do with Labour.
One thread yesterday raised the issue of our unwritten constitution being based upon an assumption of moral decency in the executive. If you are prepared to brazen out every issue (that in times past would have led to an embarrassing resignation) then there is, it seems, precious little apart from the electorate that can hold a corrupt government in check (blogs maybe!). We have seen issue after issue where we kept saying ‘oh he / she must now resign’ – but they never do. Or ‘Brown would be finished if’ – but he never is. The concept of genuine accountability has died under Labour. Most punters seem to assume that it is the economy that is Labour’s worst disaster. I for one believe that their utter debasement of public life is an equally horrible crime.
The only ’nail’ that has any meaning for them is you and me. Anyone not voting Conservative in May has no right to complain thereafter if this gang of thieves and charlatans somehow survive.
Well, based on BBC Breakfast, it won’t be the final nail. If you had no idea what happened yesterday, it wouldn’t be clear at all that the PM was asked to pay back anything, let alone £12,000. The story is, basically, they are all at it, and all furious they have to pay anything back.
The BBC are doing a wonderful job on behalf of The Bunker this morning.
However, the normally obedient Scotsman doesn’t even try the lighten the blow:
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Labour-rocked-as-Brown-is.5726420.jp
Jim Devine is the MP for Livingston, and has a majority of just 2,680 over the SNP. Has he got a better chance of holding on as an Independent?
Johnson Press (the owners of The Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday and the Edinburgh Evening News) are clearly, like Murdoch, very, very, very tired of the Rt Hon Dr James Gordon Brown MP.
Is it the final nail? Don’t be silly. Brown being asked to pay back £12,500 on rules applied retrospectively from an enquiry he set up is not remotely the same as that Hamster woman waving her cheque on TV or Phil Hopeless and his £40k.
There are plenty of miscreants on both benches who were caught with their hands in the till on day 1. Never mind rules applied after the event, these people knew what thy were doing was borderline criminal but wholly expected to get away with it.
Once the big news about MPs being investigated by the police comes along the story will have moved elsewhere. Anyway - if you’re predisposed not to like Brown whats going to upset you most, a cleaning bill or the budget deficit?
12 It wasn’t a bill for cleaning, it was mostly for laundry and ironing, which wouldn’t have been approved by the Fees Office if described as such, so it was called “cleaning services”.
That’s fraud.
So you’re not upset if your Prime Minister is a fraudster. I am, and I suspect plenty of voters are too.
Well if expenses do not kill Brown, this will:
Britain must raise taxes by £26 billion per year or cut public spending by 17 per cent in the three years to 2013-14, over and above the measures proposed in this year’s Budget, a report published today warns.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article6871962.ece
Roger,
I suspect the reason Gordon is hanging on is becasue he still thinks that the Tory heavens are going to come crashing down - just as you keep suggesting they will (ably assisted by tim of the WaffenSS and Gabble of “you can’t trust what you read in the papers” with his newspaper links).
You and your ilk are doing an excellent job - at giving succour to the PM, keeping him in place until that point (which we have probably reached) where the electoral chaos and embarrassment of his leaving is as poisonous as the electoral chaos and embarrassment of Gordon staying in post.
Good effort, all. Keep it up…
@ 2. Brown’s vignette also included how to sponge off fellow students at parties. A most unusual suggestion from somone who wraps himself in the sheeps’ clothing of “A Son of the Manse”. All in all a sign of things to come.
@4. Of course not all Labour supporters are corrupt or idiotic. Some are idealistic, others misguided, others driven by hatred of the Tories thanks to the mendacious mythology Labour have built up about the Thatcher years.
@10. What I can’t understand is how anyone in the MSM and Parliament believes that a majority of the electorate will for one moment accept the school-yard excuses of “He did it first” and “It’s not fair”
‘Scottish Labour at odds with London over al-Megrahi’
The Foreign Secretary said in a Commons statement… appeared at odds with the position of Mr Gray, Labour’s Holyrood leader, that the Libyan, who is suffering from terminal prostate cancer, should have continued to serve his sentence in Scotland.
A spokesman for Mr MacAskill said that Mr Miliband’s statement left Labour in Scotland “looking opportunistic and foolish in the way that they tried to play party politics over a difficult decision. No wonder it backfired so badly on Labour”.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article6872008.ece
“Scottish Labour”, “backfired”, “opportunistic”, “foolish” and “playing party politics”. These word seem almost tailor-made for each other: they fit so well.
Alex Salmond is an extraordinarily lucky politician to be opposed by prime chumps like Iain Gray and his wee pal Tavish Scott. And when Labour get round to kicking out the hapless Gray, who on earth are they going to appoint to their leadership? Cathy Jamieson? Mary Mulligan? Karen Whitefield? The mind boggles…
Perhaps our Morris Dancer should start work on a giant steam-powered Last Coffin-Nail gun - just to keep up with the demand caused by our PM?
Mike, I suspect that you are guilty of substituting your own view of what you think is advantageous for Labour, in their best interests, etc, with a considered judgement of how they will react, given their track record.
The probability of Brown not sitting tight until an election in May or June has to be very small, unless you have some particularly compelling piece of evidence to say otherwise.
The expenses issue, while very damaging for the body politic, does not particularly single out Brown, and so does not make Brown’s position that much worse. Wishful thinking on your part, I think.
Of course, it would be jolly exciting were Brown to shove off before the election, so I won’t be displeased were you to be right.
Very creative use of a photocropping function to put the message over, than Brown and Help.
Adam Smith @ 13
So you’re not upset if your Prime Minister is a fraudster. I am, and I suspect plenty of voters are too.
Brown has been a fraudster since day one. However unlike many successful politicians (yes Tony I am looking at you) he is really bad at it.
His policies:
- Pension thievery
- Stealth taxation
- Tax credits
- PFI
What do they all have in common?
They are design specifically to obfuscate. Hide the cost and advertise the benefit.
If a company behaved like this, it would be in serious trouble. In the financial sector, it would have its licence to operate removed.
I do think however that the expenses scandal hitting Brown personally will be a few more straws on the camel’s back even if not the last.
15. I am sure that at this very moment Gordon Brown is hunched over a computer, a single tear running down his doughy cheek. Perhaps he should quit? Then he reads Roger’s comments! “My God,” he cries, “these words from a total stranger mean so much to me!” He finds the will to go on!
Then he tosses the computer through a window because tim is a dirty Blairite.
Figures show one of the great drivers of growth in the British economy over recent years has suffered a catastrophic failure:
“remortgage figures dived by 22% compared with the previous month to just 32,000, 57% down on a year earlier”:
http://money.aol.co.uk/home-loans-up-as-remortgaging-dives/article/20091012051240424507464?rsp=Money News
One big driver of economic growth in the British economy in recent years has fallen off a cliff and lies, dashed, on the rocks below:
“remortg@ge figures dived by 22% compared with the previous month to just 32,000, 57% down on a year earlier”
http://tinyurl.com/gordon-broke-the-economy
9-I agree. The rot started with Saint Tony and people hanging on and on. Gordon will not go. The whole cabinet can resign, he’ll find a new set of placemen.
Only an election loss or a vote of no confidence in parliament triggering elections will get him out - and only once he’s lost the election.
Will Jackie Smith go into a newsagent and ask for The FT instead of the Telegraph?
Morning all and indeed the BBC has hardly mentioned one James Gordon Brown being fingered for cheating us all. Labour clearly cannot stomach the fact David Cameron has only been asked to produce a mortgage statement for £200!
Interestingly 6 of the 7 SNP MPs have been asked to pay back money and the Scottih snippet on BBC Breakfas is carrying this story without mentioning how many any of Socttish Labour’s super troughers have been asked to refund.
Last night there seemed to be a great deal of heat and thunder and very little light over the poll showing Labour only 10% behind. As long as the Tories remain in the 40s it frankly is of no relevance where Labour polls because in the real world of voters Labour ALWAYS scores less, the 1st Golden Rule of OGH.
It would be just what Labour needs for handfuls of Labour MPs to challenge Legge in the courts. Tory Central Office will think its Christmas wish list has arrived early.
Easterross @ 26
It would be just what Labour needs for handfuls of Labour MPs to challenge Legge in the courts. Tory Central Office will think its Christmas wish list has arrived early.
Labour is desperately hoping that they will be Tories. However based on previous events, Our Blue Eyed boy could turn even that to his advantage.
I think you are going to lose your money Mike, selling Brown weeks.
There is no evidence to suggest Brown will step down and it”s too late to push him aside. He has the backing of all the key players. He claims his health is good. He will not go under the cloud of the expenses scandal.
I would rate the chances of Brown not leading Labour at the next election at no shorter than 6/1. You could break even on your bet if he goes for a March election but that’s very doubtful timing with the locals coming up in May.
IF JSFL IS ABOUT Anthony WEells answered the point about the weighting of public sector workers in the Populus poll on his Uk Polling blog
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/index.php
R4 Today programme’s news opens with “MPs are annoyed with…”
Brown? Who?
The Gordon Brown Memoirs
entitled: Barack & me…
Back cover blurb
President Obama awoke to discover after 8 months in office he had be given the Nobel Peace Prize. Mr Brown awoke a week later with a demand for £12,000 he had wrongly claimed in expenses.
This is the tale of unlikely and some would say none existent friendship between 2 world leaders who would live in history. Two Orators who moved mens souls. Two winners (sort of) who overcame all odds to achieve the highest office in their lands.
Coming soon to an oxfam near you. Have courage.
On Brown, I don’t know whether it makes a difference, it depends how the polls react, and that will in turn depend on how the other leading MPs come out of this.
So far there’s been no mention of the flipping.
As for the earlier charges of fraud against Brown (and presumably Clegg) then I’m not sure whether they are valid given the retrospective nature of the cleaning and gardening caps.
Of course in the interests of balance it needs to be pointed out that a fake mortgage claim has always been outside the rules, Mr Cameron.
I also think that that Expensesgate has largely run out of steam. It’s no longer “News”. I think it would require a major new revelation to reignite the fire. MPs claiming for the capital element of their mortgages could do it. Or some of them refusing to cough up, as directed by Legg.
It will be a big factor at the General Election of course - but I think the caravan will move on again soon.
Mr Cameron said anybody who refused to repay expenses if told to do so would not be allowed to stand as a Conservative MP.
He said that anybody who refused to repay if requested by Sir Thomas Legg “can’t stand as Conservative MPs”.
“Everybody has got to take part in this process, everybody has to respond to these letters,” he said.
“MPs have to pay back the money they’re asked to by the authorities - that’s the least we can do.”
………………….”
http://page.politicshome.com/uk/mps_who_dont_repay_cant_stand_as_conservatives_says_cameron.html
34 - Eleanor Laing?
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?Senior_Tory_Eleanor_Laing_has_still_not_paid_%A325,000_expenses&in_article_id=750735&in_page_id=34
32 “fake”, tim of the WaffenSS? A bit strong, eh?
I think it is a shame the whole expenses story has over-shadowed the Damian Green investigation. We ought to know how far up the orders for his arrest went and who is responsible: http://tinyurl.com/yfb7wt9
36 - Sorry, if it applies to Mr Cameron, its an oversight.
On the Populus poll from last thread: it’s interesting that Labour escaped the 20s. However, it’s already been entirely overtaken by events and too soon after the conference season to be seen as completely reliable.
37, quite so. That story never got the media attention it deserved, it was absolutely appalling and unacceptable.
Will this be the final nail in Brown’s coffin? Not by a long way. The man is nothing if not Terminator-like in his resiliance.
MPs are reportedly angry with Brown in appointing Legg in the first place. Perhaps they have a point about him re-writing the rules (as an aside, I don’t think they have - all Legg has done is apply the criteria of ‘necessary and exclusively for their work’ which MPs should have been abiding by anyway). Brown can, and in private no doubt will, say that it’s not his fault that Legg went off on one and that there had to be an inquiry of some sort. I expect that most of the malcontents will buy that.
For the first time in a long time, Brown has got the better of the media coverage in the story, on relative terms at least. Reading the papers and especially watching the TV, one would think that all the party leaders have committed offences of a similar scale when the differences both in scale, nature and timely recompense are significant. That makes it a difficult backdrop against which to force him out.
In any case, surely he’s not going to be forced out by his own side using arguments that their opponents in their constituencies could use so readily against themselves? It would undercut their own positions even further. That’s if they could force him out - something difficult under Labour’s rules and alien to the party’s culture.
Were Brown to retire of his own choice before the election, it would very probably be off the back of a successfully completed project and for non-political reasons (eg health or family). Under no circumstances will he want to go in a position of weakness or as a victim. However, if he does find such a window of opportunity, then unless there are genuinely pressing reasons for him to go, then there then opens up the renewed possibility of electoral success - and Brown would want to stay for that reason.
He’s in something of a Catch-22, rather along the lines of ‘better to keep quiet and let people think you’re stupid than open your mouth and confirm it’. If Brown goes before the election, he will always be thought of as an electoral liability; if he sees it through, he’ll almost certainly confirm that. The thing is, Brown doesn’t want to be thought of as a liability of any sort. I therefore predict that we will see him demonstrate his favoured political tactic once again: stubborn inaction.
32 We still haven’t been told why a minister with a grace and favour apartment should be able to claim second home allowance.
Gordon has a home paid for him in London, and has done since 1987.
He should pay the full costs of his family home in Scotland, and No 10 should be treated as being his second home. He should pay back everything he has claimed in the last 12 years.
The retrospective cap on costs is dodgy. The truth is that it is not an attempt to seek truth and light, it is a last ditch attempt to retain the current system “oh look we’ve fixed it”.
What we need is for an independent commission to sit and to set fair remuneration rules for MPs to run with effect from next Parliament. The only thing you should be able to claim for is a minimal pied a terre in London, if you live more than a certain distance away (1.5 hours travel time is what Jobcentres expect you to be able to travel once you have been unemployed for 13 weeks). If you sell that pied a terre and purchase another one, your expenses claim should be capped at what you claimed for the first one. That would mean that the benefits of “flipping” would accrue from an investment made by the individual, as they would have to pay the costs of trading up.
39 MD - given that the fieldwork covered entirely the GB eye story, I wonder to what extent the poll reflected a “sympathy vote” or a return to the fold of those convinced GB was through the exit door already… But as you say….irrelevant now anyway!
Mike said: “How he must rue the day that he decided to set up the Legg investigation for he has become a victim of his own strategy.”
Standard Operating Procedure for Brown. Everything he touchs turns to dust…
How can Legg have applied the criteria of ‘necessary and exclusively for their work’ if he has allowed Brown to claim the costs of a spurious and unnecessary third property?
43, Mr. sqwawk, that seems a good explanation for Labour’s rise. Still surprised somewhat the Tories are down, but I suppose the tracker did show us that there’s a strong but small degree of volatility with all polling.
This was probably remarked upon last night, but first time I’ve seen it: http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2009/10/guardian-gagged-over-parliamentary.html
Apparently some lawyers (claimed on expenses, perhaps) have decided a newspaper (well, the Guardian) can’t report on Parliament. Ja, mein Fuhrer!
35 Tim, it’s probably no comfort but I have felt your pain. Politics is very unfair. It is all very reminiscent of the last years of Major’s premiership: honest, dogged John versus teflan Tony with his celebrity friends, his wealthy backers, his high-powered wife, his private office funded by not-so-blind trusts and his slick spin machine. How things change. Now, decent, patriotic John is warmly applauded when he enters the pavilion at the Oval and I doubt if anyone has ever refused to shake his hand because he had blood on it.
At least Cameron seems to be a man without illusions.
Steve Richards in the Independent puts the current problems with the British political classes into perspective:
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/steve-richards/steve-richards-parliament-isnt-corrupt-just-mediocre-1801802.html
I think he is a bit too generous to Parliament - its members have feathered their nests for far too long to be entirely excused of the charge of corruption (or at least venality) - but I would rather have venal clever MPs than stupid honest ones. Right now, we seem to be getting the worst of both worlds.
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/politics-headlines/voters-to-hire-jimmy-conway-from-%27goodfellas%27-200910132131/
As many have observed the BBC is excelling itself this morning at covering up Brown’s embarrassment. Remarkably, given its headline prominence, the Today programme’s report of what the papers say at 7.40am managed not to mention the Brown or Jacqui headlines.
48 The “it’s unfair” bunker attitude (they are all agin us) has spread to include Michael White in the Guardian
“By fighting the FoI campaigners in the name of privacy and then being exposed by another of those Tory front operations (not the Taxpayers’ Alliance or “Lord” Richard Dannatt on this occasion) courtesy of the Daily Telegraph, they left themselves wide open to whatever was to befall them.”
According to toenails on Today Senior Tory MPs have been coming up to him privately to express their sympathy for Gordon Brown who has been treated unfairly.
53. I imagine they have, the Tories don’t want anything to happen to Brown before the election - he’s such an asset to them
38 Gotta love tim’s chutzpah - one week the attack is “Dave of the £30 million”, the next it is the 180 degree shift, trying to wring mileage out of £200 Dave has already paid…
Can’t be any easy job though. Self-appointed Guardian that he is…
53 Wonder if they included the “leadership contender” Michael Crick reported as fuming and tearing up his brown envelope after reading his Legg letter?
Reportedly extensions and conservatories have been ruled outside of the rules and MPs who claimed for those will be expected to pay back the sums claimed. I note David Davis claimed for a replacement portico.
From Sky Boulton & Co
Another Labour MP who claims to have connections with No. 10 insiders, claims that on Sunday…Gordon Brown was “having a Nokia moment”.
http://blogs.news.sky.com/boultonandco/Post:8ccdd421-bcbd-46c6-90a4-4efcaa40832b
Morning all.
The final nail? err No, merely the latest addition to the coffin lid which has been firmly in place for the past year.
Another hammer blow to Gordon’s ‘moral compass’ which was already decidedly tarnished and broken.
Mike, is this the final nail?
Is there anyone giving odds that Brown will not even step down if he looses the General Election:
I’m beginning to feel lucky!
My Goodness what a car crash Patrick Cormack was on Today this Morning- pompous, blustering arrogant and just plain stupid!
Any more Tories like him will stuff the Conservatives just as much as Labour, Cameroon discipline or not.
54.
The final nail? No. Brown will lose the election held on May 6th next year, on May 8th will announce that he will stand down as Labour leader after a leadership election (he won’t be able to decide by May 7th).
Does anyone know whether Jacqui Smith got/gets a letter from Legg?
If so, how do its contents and requirements rank against yesterday’s ‘Get out of Jail Free’ card that the Standards Committee gave her?
60 Sir Patrick’s constituency tried to deselect him well before the expenses stuff, but he fought back and got re-selected, presumably having hopes of the Speakership. He is an honourable man I believe, remember his wavering voice in the Michael Martin debate referring back to the Norway debate, and Parliament needs those jealous of its privileges to protect it from an over-mighty executive but he certainly could not be described as “in touch” with public opinion.
You would have thought the fuss over his letter calling for the ACA to be rolled into pay would have warned him off the media.
I can’t see that Brown will be harmed any more than anyone else,’They’re all in it together’ Nick Robinson reported that senior Tories were expressing sympathy for GB and felt he was being unfairly treated.
60
Cormack, was just amazing, if Cameron was listening, he’ll be ordering a hit squad this morning.
60 - Thats true, but I do think that the three party leaders are coming over as wimps in an attempt to appear strong and get closure.
I wonder whether on this retrospective stuff the public may have more respect for someone who points out how ridiculous it is.
Hair shirts are fine up to a point but if the leader wearing it hasn’t got a spine then whats the point.
41. David Herdson - “He’s in something of a Catch-22, rather along the lines of ‘better to keep quiet and let people think you’re stupid than open your mouth and confirm it’. If Brown goes before the election, he will always be thought of as an electoral liability; if he sees it through, he’ll almost certainly confirm that. The thing is, Brown doesn’t want to be thought of as a liability of any sort.”
It is delicious, isn’t it.
Whatever Brown does, he is going to go down in the history books as an immense loser. Anyone who knows anything about his ginormous ego knows that this will totally crush the man.
All self-inflicted I’m afraid. So my sympathy is next to non-existent.
We all know what Gordon Browns staying power is like. I believe he will cling on to the general election and fight it, as he thinks he can win. Deluded certainly. But it is equally delude that a £16 billion garage sale is going to help bring down the defect.
Not long now before VAT goes back to 17.5% (at least!)
“Is this going to be the final nail?”
No. Not even a silver stake through the heart at the crossroads at midnight, festooned with cloves of garlic, would be the final nail. Brown would find some way of wriggling out from under it. Having achieved his life’s dream by slithering under the front door of No 10 and coiling himself immovably round the banisters, not even being chopped up into neat segments and barbecued for snake steaks will deter him. Which, from a Conservative point of view, is ideal.
56 IIRC Davis repaid the cost of the portico.
O/T Guido and Iain Dale are riding to the support of the Guardian in the press gagging story. Looks like they have revealed the parties to the injunction and the subject. Must admit I was surprised a judge considered injuncting Parliamentary reporting - seems to go to heart of Parliamentary Privilege. Can’t see the injunction standing an appeal.
Carter-Ruck involved by any chance?
67. Absolutely. This was the Daily Mail report when Brown thought it was clever to appoint Legg.
Gordon Brown launched a desperate attempt to catch up with David Cameron yesterday in the race to win back public trust following the MPs’ expenses scandal.
The Prime Minister said he wanted the Commons members’ allowances committee to agree an independent audit of every MPs’ expenses claim for the past four years.
But the Tory leader accused him of failing to show leadership and having a ‘tin ear’ to public outrage.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1180696/MPs-EXPENSES-Brown-plays-catch-race-public-trust-Camerons-manoeuvrings.html#ixzz0Tnd5zpSl
71 Of course
That is no surprise.
LOLz. Love that picture of Jacqui Five-Bellies.
69. Russell - “Which, from a Conservative point of view, is ideal.”
This is the profoundest irony of them all: the harder Gordon clings on, the better it is for PM Dave.
At this rate Labour are heading for a “Canada Result”.
If this is right, Hogg is going to have to pay back the most: unfortunate name.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1219708/Expenses-Defiant-MPs-vow-fight-demand-pay-1million.html
Unless…………..
Interestingly the censored Parliamentary Question is in Carter-Rucks wiki page. How long before the page gets locked…?
what I found astonishing was the shouting match that was supposed to have gone on at the PLP meeting.
The scum can sprout backbones when it comes to cash from their pockets, yet roll over like stuffed toys when the prospect of getting rid of their biggest electoral liabilty appears on a distant horizon.
59…look at Betfair “leader exit dates” market.
4. Well done, you can read.
People can’t be voting Labour because they’ve made this country an oasis of prosperity, because they’ve promoted our basic freedoms or because they’ve made us respected on the world stage, can they?
I’ve often wondered what more Brown has to do to lose their support.
It really is a fascinating time in politics right now. You have to think that any previous rational PM, as mortally wounded as Gordon is, would have measured the damage he was doing to self, party and country - and have stepped aside. But it is as if Eden or Wilson had decided to tough it out through to an election. Gordon is that last remaining party guest who will not leave, refuses the subtle hints (”here’s your coat”, people feigning death…) - and in the wee small hours has just dug out Abba Gold and is determined to dance.
I can only think that his hatred of the Tories is so visceral, he is prepared to go “all in” - and with 4-9 off-suit, bet the Labour Party on the off-chance he can bluff the voters into folding.
It seems as though there is a ‘final nail’ on a weekly basis.If this isn’t the final nail, another will be winging its way soon.
The markets are hard to read. I think that TearGate had more resonance than LaundryGate, as Gates go, and the current state of play indicates that Brown stays about 64% of the time.
I spent the early hours poring over Baxter’s Battlemap.It’s a great tool and would be even greater if it were anywhere near accurate.
72. This episode proves, yet again, that Brown’s fundamental failing as PM (among many) is that his hatred and absolute obsession with out-maneuvering the Tories, at every opportunity, prevents him from making the right statesman-like decisions one would expect in a leader.
As Michael Corleone in the Godfather put it: ‘never hate your enemies. It clouds your judgment’.
OI - WIKIO! Where’s pb.com???
http://blog.wikio.com/uk/2009/10/top-european-blogs-october-2009.html
As you’re all men, over fifty (nothing wrong with that) I’m sure you’ll all appreciate this: Heather Brooke FOI campaigner on Newsnight with Sir Stuart Bell, whom she laughs at, Benedict Brogan and Tony Wright: Boudicea battles the Romans.
and if you haven’t seen Smith’s performance, here’s her ’apology’.
FPT:
He hasn’t got a Legg to stand on.
Anyone else notice that stjohn’s pun on the previous thread was unashamedly repeated on Newsnight? - Even Paxo groaned.
67. I think Brown genuinely believes he’ll go down in history as the man who “saved the world”.
re 85. Who knows how this is compiled? We get 2.5m to 3m page impressions a month - about three times more than Iain Dale.
In the Blair plan, Europe is all, Parliament due for demolition.
In such a (political) war, there have to be casualties. Legg like a dog only has one master. Troublesome Captain Brown will be sent down with his ship to die a hero’s death.
Meanwhile First Lady Cherie measures up her curtains in the President’s Palace…..they won’t be brown in colour…..’now then, have you paid your shredding bill at the Fees Office yet, Tony?’.
86, hmm, first video doesn’t seem to play for me. Second seems to be fine.
Meanwhile, in the real world, it’s looking increasingly like a Lib Dem win in Bedford.
Final nail - not a sausage of a chance.
I’m surprised that we haven’t got lists of misdemeanours in the papers - however has a serious problem is clearly keeping it to themselves for now.
Is there anything happening in parliament today?
QT line up for Griffin takes shape
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6871898.ece
Griffin
Straw
Huhne
Bonnie Greer (token writer)
Con + tbc
87. There has to be a pun involving Cleggover and Legg… but I’m yet to find it.
81
‘Boiling Frog’ syndrome.
The public has grown used to the unadulterated awfulness of Labour. But each step-by-step revelation is not enough to utterly revolt the ‘man in the street’.
On the other hand, the cumulative weight of Brown’s inadequacies should sink him, but because the political environment is constantly changing, it is as if Brown steps forth freshly each morning, to sully the new day.
89 It’s all to do with links - the more article links, the higher the ranking. Links to PB from high traffic sites will push the ranking right up - so for example Dale and Guido linking to each other about the Carter-Ruck thingy will add lots of brownie points to both.
The rankings are revised once a quarter and blog rolls don’t count/neither does site traffic.
Hope that helps.
97 replace traffic with ranking in the second sentence!
92 So Bedford will show that again, the LibDems are happy to tap into the latent racist vote…
And then people wonder why the LibDems don’t do black and Asian MP’s…
Jacqui Smith may now be a wealthy woman, but that picture of her in The Daily Telegraph must be the final nail in terms of her being re-elected. Even at skinny odds of 0.22/1, the Tories look value to win her seat at Redditch.
78. yes that’s the benefit of the internet, bullying injunctions to suppress parliamentary privilege basically can’t be enforced any more.
70.Re Guardian, who is attacking Parliament?
The judiciary.
Who’s decided all must be paid back. Legg
Who has appointed the judges for twenty years? Legg
Who does Legg work for? Irvine.
Who is Cherie Blair associated with romantically? Cherie Blair.
What are Blair, Irvine and Legg desperate about?
Stopping Parliament from sinking the Lisbon Treaty. Dirty tricks and all are now being deployed to crush Parliament.
100 It is a truly awful picture isn’t it - says a thousand words to coin a phrase.
102. interruptions. Cherie ….Irvine.
102 “Who is Cherie Blair associated with romantically? Cherie Blair.”
That is really rather good, Tapestry.
92
It’s a glorified local election. Of course the Liberals will do well as ever. So what?
“Mayor of Bedford” sounds like “highest mountain in Belgium” for Wow factor…
‘Apparently some lawyers (claimed on expenses, perhaps) have decided a newspaper (well, the Guardian) can’t report on Parliament. Ja, mein Fuhrer!’
Morris Dancer, that’s not quite true. Lawyers don’t decide, Judges do. It looks as if the newspaper is simply being prevented from reporting a matter on which they’ve previously been injuncted. No ones squashing the rights of Parliament.
There have been so many ‘final nails’ that Mr Brown’s political coffin is starting to look like an West African fetish object.
108. I’m surprised that got through the filters on the first attempt!
110. 109 quality comment though!
94: No need to point out the obvious….Bonnie Greer is black. Whch should spice things up a bit.
“….How he must rue the day that he decided to set up the Legg investigation for he has become a victim of his own strategy….”
The problem with this statement is that Brown doesn’t do strategy. Brown does tactics. Everything he does is geared around the next news cycle. If he can kick something into the long grass, for one day of decent headlines that is deemed to be a victory. The fact that the rest of the world can see it will come back bigger, stronger, faster and bite him even harder than taking it on the chin at the time, always escapes him. He is either a bully who cows his media teams into silence, or he is surrounded by an exceptionally poor media team. In fact thinking about it, on past evidence he is probably a bully with an exceptionally poor media team as he is unable to attract talent who are capable of independent thought.
108, yes, you’re right. I apologise, and submit myself to the cooler.
103:
‘Who is Cherie Blair associated with romantically? Cherie Blair.’
Eh?
112 - Black American, spiced up even more so imho.
[106] So Cameron was just deliberatly wasting his time making visits to the town then? If it matters when you win it can certainly matter if you don’t win. Labour were walking by-elections and local elections across the country and across the board in the years leading up to 97.
It is just more evidence that the support for the Conservatives is tepid and shallow. Doesn’t say they can’t win, but this election remains quite tricky.
If Brown quit tomorrow, the Tories will have a hell of a fight on their hands (so would the Lib Dems, of course).
108 I fail to see how the House of Commons order paper can be the subject of an injunction. Surely it is (a) covered by Parliamentary privilege abd (b)in the public domain.
Personally I think that these injunctions which prevent the reporting of the subject matter of an injunction or the fact that an injunction has been sought, are an affront to free speech and should be banned by statute.
Similarly I think that libel damages should be limited to the actual loss suffered.
The Beeb were absolutely shameless this morning in their Save Labour Today programme. You’d think the story was entirely about the Conservatives. Not only did they dedicate a large segment of the programme to a 3-month old story about a Conservative MP, they even managed to dredge up Lord Archer for a tedious piece about some trashy book he wrote. Why today, do you think?
I think this has a good chance of working, at least to neutralise some of the damage to Brown in particular and Labour in general.
The more I read about Jimma Broon, the more I’m convinced that Patrick was right a week or two back.
Patrick wrote that Broon will eventually turn out to be a Good Thing - because he’s so obviously utterly unfitted for the job of PM that we will scrutinise aspirants far more carefully in future.
IMO this latest bugger-up shows once again that it’s Jimma’s character that’s defective. What he did was to postpone something for a few months in the sure knowledge that either a further fiasco or a whitewash would ensue (which would have been a fiasco itself).
Why the hell did he do it? I suggest for the reason that lazy people don’t bother to clean the house. Being diligent pays off in the future, when you have a nice clean house. But being lazy pays off right now, because you get to stay on your fat @rse albeit it in a filthy house.
It’s called “time preference” and it’s a personality flaw in someone whose role calls for forward thinking. So a deficient personality leads to deficient judgement, every time.
The man is a failure as a human being on so many levels. He’s mean, spiteful, treacherous, deceitful, cowardly, dishonest, greedy, arrogant, fat, ugly, lazy, envious, hypocritical, bigoted, inept, unprincipled, and Scottish.
I honestly cannot think of one single good quality the vicious ageing useless nasty b@stard actually has.
I have complained (again) to the Today programme about their shockingly one-sided reporting this morning. Fat lot of good it will do.
I listened to all of it and frankly, I was disgusted.
They seemed completely content to spout almost verbatim the Labour whips office ‘line to take’ - which is that the report is unfair on the basis that MP’s claiming as much or more in mortgage interest relief for huge London homes (that only toffs can afford) aren’t being penalised whereas hard working Labour MP’s too busy to clean their own humble flats (the sort chosen by gritty workaholic Scottish son-of-the-manse types) are being singled out for punishment.
The truth is that unlike mortgage interest (which is capped) there were no limits set on cleaning which a cynic (oh - and Sir Thomas Legg) might conclude left cleaning and maintentence as an avenue to be exploited by anyone intent on maxing the MP’s ‘benefits’ system.
87/92, ah, working now. Might’ve been a problem with my connection/computer. Cheers for putting them up
117: C+N Tory win
Norwich North: Tory win
Local elections: Lots of tory wins
Euro elections:lots of tory wins.
Look at the facts before you trout rubbish.
Either byelections and local elections mean something, Slackbladder, or they don’t.
Normally you Tories opt to say that they are meaningless.
117. “It is just more evidence that the support for the Conservatives is tepid and shallow. Doesn’t say they can’t win, but this election remains quite tricky.”
I’d agree with that.
However, I’m not convinced the public are ever “enthusiastic” about voting for a change to a Conservative government. They certainly weren’t in 1979 and I don’t think anyone expected the Tories to win in 1951 or 1970 either.
I think a lot of people talk about how they’re not sure about the Tories but - when it comes to them, the ballot paper and their pencil - they will still make an “X” in the box that counts.
Consumer prices fell 1.1% according tothe BBC
125. That’s probably right. In terms of floating voters, as opposed to tribal Tories or tribal Labour who will always vote for that party whatever, they possibly vote Labour with the heart, Tory with the head.
126 oops.. fell to 1.1%
123. 117 & 125
“C+N Tory win
Norwich North: Tory win
Local elections: Lots of tory wins
Euro elections:lots of tory wins.
Look at the facts before you trout rubbish.”
Socialist People just can’t accept defeat in a democratic society.!!
@121. Yeah it’s all a cospiracy. Good grief - is there any end to Tory paranoia? And they wonder why the voters, rightly, remain suspicious of them?
Can’t see this damaging the PM too much - there’s only so much curiosity pinched by bombing a smoking ruin.
They key issue in the next election will be narrowing the Tory lead enough to hobble their terrifically damaging policies for the economy.
115.106. Sorry. my 2 year old interrupting me, and ageing mother !
I corrected at 105. you’re not concentrating !
120 JohnR, Do you have any redeeming features yourself.
Jackie Smith went into a newsagents in Redditch this morning. Took a long look a the headlines and turned white.
Tne newsagent asked. “Do you want a Telegraph”?
Smith replied. “Er, no. I prefer The FT.”
128. I nearly choked on my coffee when I saw what you wrote at 126.
100 Marquee Mark
That is a pretty lazy assumption.
Elagabalus at 43: “What we need is for an independent commission to sit and to set fair remuneration rules for MPs to run with effect from next Parliament.”
Yes. It’s called the Kelly commission and it will report next month.
I think this will damage the modest recovery in the Labour vote seen in the conference season, but not for very long - people have pretty much reached a view on expenses and factored it into their voting intentions, and it was diminishing in impact until yesterday. I’d think the main impact will be localised to the perceived worst offenders. I don’t normally comment on other MPs, but if you look up my extract from the Legg letter on the last thread you’ll see the sort of cases where very substantial payments (either made or refused) are likely to be publicised in a few weeks’ time - in particular, anyone whose ACA payments were directly or indirectly to relatives will be having the entire sums disallowed, regardless of mitigating factors.
The case for Brown is that he’s set up a proper indedpendent inquiry, it’s applied rules which are generally acknowledged to be a bit harsh, they’ve affected him as well and he’s paid immediately without quibbling; in addition, he’s set up the Kelly commission to avoid a recurrence. I think that’s a reasonable position unless you’re in the Patrick corner of ‘they’re all lying bastards’, but with my uncanny nose for these things I sense that Patrick wasn’t going to vote for us anyway.
124. I thought the general rule was that local elections mean everything, if the Lib Dems win them.
And that even if they don’t win, they are still good news for the Lib Dems (somehow or other).
The Beeb may have come in for a good deal of flak this morning, but at least Newsnight last night explained how the original all party committee of MPs responsible for deciding Jacqui Smith’s fate was reduced to one comprising 5 Labour MPs and 1 Tory, who despite deciding finding against her as regards as regards her domestic arrangements, agreed that the mildest slap on the wrist and a grudging apology to a largely empty HoC was appropriate punishment and that she should be entitled to keep every penny of the 6 figure sum she had claimed.
Quite extraordinary.
135 Was just trying to throw out some ground bait and see who would bite…
129. Wayne - you really can be a douche sometimes.
I one of the staunchest Tories on this site - which you’d know if you’ve ever read any of my posts over the past three years.
Just because I paint a picture of how I think voting behaviour in this country operates, which doesn’t accord 100% with your rose-tinted spectacles perception of the Conservative Party, does not make me a Socialist.
136: To anticipate responses - when I say the rules are a bit harsh, I’m referring to the element of retrospection introduced by Legg. There’s a case for it, but not one that would readily be accepted by most people if HMRC did it to their 5-year-old tax returns (’we’ve decided that the deduction that we allowed you then was too generous, so pay it back’).
Has anyone yet explained why Gordon Brown has not been required to repay his Sky Subscription paid for by the taxpayer?
134
Sorry!! Damned cold in the house this morning, it was -1.1 degrees according to my car temp gauge when I left this morning. A bit of a coincidence!
Apparently Cameron was on GMTV this morning but I can’t find the video on their website.
Re my post at 144
Actually, here is the link
http://www.gm.tv/videos/gmtv-highlights/39741-expenses-row.html
33: As for the earlier charges of fraud against Brown (and presumably Clegg) then I’m not sure whether they are valid given the retrospective nature of the cleaning and gardening caps.
On the basis of tax legislation as currently applied they are. If you have a tax avoidance scheme, you are required to submit details to the authorities. Unlike other jurisdictions (Germany, Switerland etc) the authority does not give a ruling on whether they’re legal but instead can come back and investigate at any time (including on the basis of subsequently decided jurisprudence). The analogy to the expenses issue is striking: we have been criminalised by their supline parliamentary action and all they are facing is the same that we little people have for some time.
Now, I don’t think that JGB is conciously corrupt BUT…he has, to all intents, sucked on the comforting teat of the state for his entire adult life and for the last 12 years has, arguably (and like most other senior ministers) been shielded from reality. His idea of what is corrupt is likely to be funamentally at odds with the court of public opinion.
141 - Wrong analogy. It’s as if HMRC had looked at 5 year old tax returns and said “we’ve decided that the deduction that you allowed yourself then was too generous, so pay it back”. Which is a perfectly fair thing to do. Or are you claiming that the fees office was fearless and independent, because I don’t think you’ll get many takers for that proposition.
141. Hmm.
Is that a bit like Labour demanding that single mothers living below the poverty line return the excess tax credits they were given “in error” retrospectively ?
142 Maybe Legg took pity on Gordon - having to pay money out of his own pocket to Murdoch might have been felt to be too much after The Sun’s declaration??
144 - It s on this link
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8304125.stm
All of the papers are reporting that Cameron is threatening MPs ‘pay up or you can’t stand as a Con MP at the election’.
Another nail in the coffin of Brown & Labour, Cameron yet again limiting the damage to him & the Conservatives.
121 - Marcus,
Your complaint to the BBC would be better directed to Sir Patrick Cormack.
141: 136: To anticipate responses - when I say the rules are a bit harsh, I’m referring to the element of retrospection introduced by Legg. There’s a case for it, but not one that would readily be accepted by most people if HMRC did it to their 5-year-old tax returns (’we’ve decided that the deduction that we allowed you then was too generous, so pay it back’).
I’m sorry to diappoint you but that is what is, in essence, happening aleady with retrospective reviews. Little sympathy.
145, mmm, Emma Crosby. Not seen her since she left Sky.
[60] - Is there anyone giving odds that Brown will not even step down if he looses the General Election
That suggests a potentially interesting spread bet:
“At what time on election night/morning will either leader of Labour or the Conservatives concede that they have lost the election, and the other will be Prime Minister?”
The time could be quite different to, in particular a lot later than, previous general elections, due to the large number of constituencies that may delay counting until the Friday morning. There’s also the stubborn Brown factor, and the residual possibility of a close result, in terms of whether Cameron gains an outright majority.
And yet, if there is a complete Labour wipeout, sending them to below 200 seats, that would become obvious relatively quickly, possibly leading to an earlier concession.
If you are of nervous disposition, look away now.
http://order-order.com/2009/10/13/jacqui-smith-crime-without-punishment/
Does NPmp have a view about the composition of the Standards Committee which approved the Report about Jackie Smith on Sept 225 Lab Mps, and 1 Tory?
155 - Thats a big committee.
138 PfP
+1 i saw that and was amazed. Just having to say sorry is about as severe as the punishments I give my 4 year old for snatching his sister’s toys. Pathetic - and HE at least has to give the toy back!
Today programme was spinning for Labour this morning for all it was worth. I think it’s too late though.
And anecdotally, people in the office are talking about it today, with disgust. Not a single mention of any of the party conferences at all when they were on though. This is not “diminishing in impact” NPMP…
Good for Cameron for threatening to chuck out those who don’t pay the money back. It’s the very least he can do.
141 NPMP - so peeps like Mr McNulty who appears to have paid for his parents’ house could be in the frame?
If so that’s a lot of money.
155. I mistyped: read 5 Lab MPs and 1 Tory.
Just heard a funny story about Cameron’s visit to Bedford yesterday. He was given a tour of an old peoples’ centre and one old lady insisting on reading him a long poem. Unfortunately it was about geriatric sex.
159 - Sir George Young and Nicholas Soames are also on that Committee
136 Nick P - I think the political reality is that voters will not be very interested in the (perfectly reasonable) points you make, but will simply see the repayment demands as evidence of guilt, and the bigger the amount involved, the bigger the guilt.
That being the case, the only valid political response is ‘pay up and shut up’. Anything else will be highly counter-productive to the individuals and parties involved.
It’s not fair, and it’s very damaging. But that’s the reality.
119 - How is the BBC’s coverage of the issue different to the coverage of other broadcasters? As far as I can see it is pretty much the same.
Interesting piece from Tim M - he wonders why the Guardian has gone particularly OTT since last week after being a bit more snuggly recently.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/thetorydiary/2009/10/what-has-happened-to-the-toryguardian-relationship.html
160 Mike S - How did he respond?
160. lol!
I didn’t see much bias in the BBC Today programme. Frankly, the fact that all politicians constantly carp about bias on Today explains the true lie of the land pretty well.
They had a Labour MP on and a Conservative MP. The Conservative MP made a complete fool of himself.
159 - Sir George Young and Nicholas Soames are also on that Committee
by tim October 13th, 2009 at 10:08 am
tim, care to tell us who was in attendance at the committee meeting that decided on Jacquies punishment?
167 wibbler - The bias was in the long piece on Djangoly - an old story. Why him, rather than the much bigger and more topical story of Brown?
Two MPs on Derbyshire in a mo talking about their letters - hope it’s not Patrick McCormack !
160 - That Jackie Smithson - she’s a very naughty girl.
161 tim
Did you watch Newsnight yesterday?
It made clear that Sir George Young had left to become a frontbencher. The Lib Dems (I think) were at the party conference. The Plaid Cymru chap and the other Conservatives couldn’t make it.
It ended up being 5 Labour MPs and 1 Conservative making the decision on what to do about Jacqui Smith - a pretty cosy arrangement…
14 That’s why the Tories are not planning to rescind Labour’s 50% top tax rate, when they know that the basic rate of income tax will rise to 25% (with the re-introduction of a 10% rate for the lowest paid), VAT will rise to at least 22.5%, tax on petrol by 10p per litre, etc,etc and at least 500,000 non jobs of the 1,000,000 total added to the public payroll during Labour’s 12 years in office will have to be scrapped.
The public has absolutely no conception whatever of just how tough things are set to become after Labour’s profligacy.
The recession over in the UK? Don’t make me larf, we haven’t even started to feel the pain yet.
168 - Don’t tell me the Etonians were at lunch?
Didn’t Young and Soames turn up?
So much going on. Courts preventing a newspaper reporting the workings of parliament* and the standards committee acts like a kangaroo court, only without the punishment bit. The PM gets shafted by an auditor he appointed. Various MPs are embarking on a whingathon about their ill-gotten gains.
And there’s an election in Bedford. On which point, does anyone know if there are any leaflets out? Any PPBs we can view? Any debates that can be viewed on t’net? What are the lines being taken?
* If you still don’t know what this disgraceful injunction is about, have a look at Guido, Next Left, Dale or my blog. NPMP could redeem himself by outlining the matter on the floor of the house. Some MP should.
Newsnight last night was perfectly splendid: a heart warming exhibition of brown-bashing. sample quote from Pax:”cleaning up parliament is turning out to be almost as expensive as cleaning Gordon Brown’s second home”. plus a little graphic to make jacqui smith look ridiculous, a robust suggestion that the committee decision that js needn’t repay anything was a labour stitch up, and open mockery of stuart bell by pax and heather thingummy. heart warming stuff.
SO:
1. bbc “bias” cuts both ways
2. almost all such bias is pretty much invisible to non-anoraks
3. however true an allegation of bias is the person making it always (and i do mean always) comes across as a boring loser. sorry, but this rule has been extensively tested and is always, without exception, true.
174, tim, tim, tim, tim, been made to look ever so slightly foolish again haven’t you. Now must remember to do ctrl +f again. Bye, bye.
154, judging by his past behaviour, I wouldn’t be surprised if Brown didn’t resign at all, even if he lost the election badly. He seems quite capable on clinging on until formally challenged, under Labour party rules, partly because he can misread the situation badly enough to believe that a Conservative government would collapse, letting him back in, even if Cameron had a 3 digit majority.
172 - So the Tories hadn’t bothered to replace Young and Soames couldn’t be bothered?
That said, the Smith case is a travesty as she’s clearly lied about her main home.The retrospective stuff is nonsense.
169 Richard Nabavi
Yes, they perhaps should have covered Brown in more detail - but not to do so probably wasn’t “bias” but just an editorial decision.
On Djanogly, well, they do these ‘constituency visits’ all the time. I remember the vox pops they (the BBC generally, not necessarily Today) did in Margaret Moran’s constituency, and in Andrew Mackay’s. It does seem that Djanogly had massive amounts of cleaning and gardening done - far more so than most - and might therefore be one of the MPs asked for a large amount back by Legg.
This should cheer tim up:
*Klaus will “never sign” Lisbon Treaty*
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article6871365.ece
Good Morning Expences Scandalized Voters For Nick Palmer Worldwide.
Meanwhile …. Mike @ 160. I like to take this opportunity to state quite firmly that the old lady poet was not Mrs Jack W !!
Jack W is 107.
156 No it’s not, sometimes you get a Committee of the Whole House.
136 NPMP, we will see how independent the Kelly commission is when it reports. At the moment, the scandal to my mind is that 600+ MPs have connived at setting up a system that allows them to trough as much as they can, but can claim it is “within the rules”. There seems to be no acceptance that you are all employed by us, to represent us, at our pleasure, and that we, not you, ought to set your remuneration.
By the way, you have never commented on my point that Gordon should not claim 2nd Home Allowance as he already has a second home, No 10 Downing Street, which is funded by the taxpayer. I have raised the point whenever we are discussing expenses and you are online. You have neither supported nor rejected my position. What is your view? Why do we pay for Gordon’s home in London and his family home in Scotland?
155
Spot on,the committee that let Smith off the hook had 5 Labour MP’s and 1 Tory,the others were unable to attend.
By anyone’s definition it was about as far from impartial as you can get it should be ruled invalid.
Hopefully Legg will demand that this porker repays the taxpayer in full.
175: And there’s an election in Bedford. On which point, does anyone know if there are any leaflets out?
I was there on Saturday (Birmingham thumped, incidentally) and there were Conservatives around but didn’t see any others. Same in St Albans on Saturday: lots of enthusastic Conservatives, some even under 40.
Oh oh - Nadine and Lamb on R5.
£241 for Nadine - double claim for phone bill that she wasn’t paid twice for - she has bank statement to show it.
Waiting for Lamb next
176 - As far as I can tell, the BBC is biased because it does not report stories in the way that Tory supporters want it to report them. Strangely enough, though, while all reports on the latest developments that I have seen or read use Brown’s repayments as a hook - which s what the BBC also did - very few have gone onto focus on them in detail. The majority editorial opinion in broadcasting and newspaper newsrooms seems to be that the big story is the reaction of MPs in general to what Legg has done.
186 - Has Nadine located her main home yet?
188: I don;t know tim, why dont you ask her?
181. If Klaus sticks to his word, I’m going to send him a large crate of ale.
141
Nick,
Hopefully the public will get a second go at getting their money back from Smith via Legg and she will not be allowed to pocket over £100,000 which was incorrectly claimed?
Alternatively any future benefit or tax fraudsters will just have to say sorry in public but can keep their illegal gains?
180 wibbler - What’s the difference between ‘bias’ and an ‘editorial decision’?
Given the Djanogly case is either an old story or speculation (as you say, he might be asked to pay something back), it is surely a very odd editorial decision to focus (at considerable length, by Today standards) on his constituency. Why not Brown’s, or Clegg’s, where there actually is some news to which it might be interesting to get people’s reaction?
181
So he’ll probably decide to sign next week then?
MPs’ expenses: kitchen cabinets and a piper in Gordon Brown’s claims
From a new Ikea kitchen to the cost of hiring a bagpiper, Gordon Brown’s expense claims were among the most colourful and varied of any MP.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/6311654/MPs-expenses-kitchen-cabinets-and-a-piper-in-Gordon-Browns-claims.html
Hello, at last sticking the knife in and rightly so on his expenses!
192 - It was far more damaging to the Tories to give Cormack access to the airwaves.
186 Re Nadine’s phone bill - Legg wouldn’t claim to be perfect. that’s why he’s allowed a 3 week period to resolve any errors or misunderstandings.
192 Richard Nabavi
Well… the difference is that there is a finite amount of time and the editors have to decide how to fill it. Some things are going to get dropped.
I personally would have gone with Brown, but to be fair to the producers, that was covered massively on R4 and more generally on the BBC yesterday.
Djanogly is just the victim of arbitrariness, much as Julie Kirkbride was. The piece in his constituency was probably prepared some time ago and they were waiting for an opportune moment to use the vox populi.
That isn’t bias, it’s just unfortunate for Djanogly.
195 tim - True. CCHQ should have made sure someone more on-message was available.
Well if Soames is on any committee, they won’t be cutting the food allowance.
The Agreement of the People http://www.constitution.org/eng/agreepeo.htm
That would show our MPs who is boss…
The price of gold is riding rapidly so far today. Gordon - look back and weep!
Norman Lamb on R5 asked for annual mortgage statements but no request for money, just back up evidence.
He’s arguing that Legg retrospective levels is against ‘natural justice’ and he’d fight for a constituent in the same position.
Interesting POV.
The recessions upside
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23755695-suspenders-hold-up-well-in-recession.do
Well you can but dream.
202 - Good for Lamb.
Makes a change from the pompous whingers and the leaders/wimps.
[178] - I wouldn’t be surprised if Brown didn’t resign at all, even if he lost the election badly. He seems quite capable on clinging on until formally challenged, under Labour party rules…
I should clarify that I was not thinking of when Brown would resign as leader of the Labour party, but when he would publicly acknowledge that Cameron would be the next PM.
I think that Major did this as part of his acceptance speech, when personally re-elected as MP for Huntingdon.
Presumably, if things were going badly enough, Brown would do the same when the result in his constituency was announced. This is not certain, though. Hence potentially interesting as a spread bet?
re 185. There are very few leaflets in the Bedford election because of the very stringent controls on expenses. In a parliamentary by-election each candidate can splash out £100,000. In this election, with 117,000 voters (must bigger than a Westminster seat) the maximum is less than £10,000.
This is screwing all the parties and is one reason why I think that it’s much closer between the Tories and the Lib Dems.
A case of Djanogly-Djanogly Watcha?
David Cameron’s insistence on GMTV that all Tory MPs would have to comply with Legg’s final decision is now the top BBC story and also in the web editions of the Telegraph and Mail. Not bad in seizing the initiative once again.
Twitter trending topics include:
Guardian
Carter-Ruck
#carterruck
Trafigura
142. PfP. The Sky sports subs may come under expenses less than £100 that Legg specifically excluded from his calculations.
173. Those extreme policies would be madness and not only kill any fledgling growth stone dead but send the economy into reverse. On that basis I would also be selling Tory and buying into Lib Dem/Labour.
207 - You Jonathans should stick together.
Am I the only person who thinks Jacqui looks like Toby Maguire when he’s angry in that picture?
95: how will Griffin deal with the revelations about Straw facilitating the building of a mosque in his constituency with money from a Qatari sheikh with links to the Muslim Brotherhood, I wonder? See the ST article - I don’t have the link sorry. It seems to me that Straw is vulnerable on the allegation that he - and Labour generally - have been far too close to extremist elements within Islam and far too relunctant to challenge those who are essentially hostile to free speech and liberal democracy. BTW I am absolutely not a supporter of the BNP but I do hate the way Labour has failed to stand up to religious fascism and to stand up for liberal values.
187 I agree. You will find mirror-image complaints on left leaning websites, though - this is not just a tory thing. There is an interesting cognitive dissonance in this thread: freedom of speech in parliament = good, bedrock of our liberty; any microscopic sign of bbc having an opinion on anything = speechcrime.
Brown gains eight-legged support:
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/science-%26-technology/scientists-discover-tedious%2c-left%11wing-spider-200910132133/
Did anyone hear Jacqui Smiths’ association chairman on the radio yesterday? Absolute heroine, no problems at all, will definitely win again etc. etc.. He was so out of touch he made people like Cormack and Steen seem at the cutting edge of public opinion.
124″Either byelections and local elections mean something, Slackbladder, or they don’t.Normally you Tories opt to say that they are meaningless”
As a Lib dem I know only too well that byelections mean nothing(except a temporary boost in national opinion polls)
Annual Local elections are like a large opinion poll sample and give a ggod indcation of swing since seat were last contested.The swing is usually very similar to that prevailing in national polls.
Therfor eyou are back to concluding that nationalm opinion poll swings are the best way of predicting GE results.I m anot convinced that regional swings add nmuch except in the obvoious cases of Scotland and Wales.
As posted before Guardian ICM averages for the year preceding a GE are a pretty accurate guide to the final vote shares(eg 1997,2001,2005)
Currently the averages for the parties onGurdian ICM up to September are Con 41.3,Lab 27.3,Lib 18.9,Oth 11.5.
The 2005 actual GE showed Lab and Lib dems gaining 1% above 22204 ans Labour and others losing 1%.
Thus the likely GE outcome for 2010 is 42.3,27.3,19.9,11.5.
a majority of 100 for the Tories
,Lab 28.3
Nick Palmer
I accept what you say but that is not my criticism of Brown. As usual he has obfuscated, dithered, deceived and then responded in his usual bureacratic ‘let’s have another committeee, let’s have another report’ nonsensical manner. He has turned a drama into a crisis by his lack of decisive action and leadership. He couldn’t lead a dog.
Let alone were his ministers and himself up to their neck in it but he had to make it worse with his ridiculous youtube moment, his ‘within the rules’ defence, his failure to intervene on two votes (IIRC?) on the issue and lead his party prior to the scandal blowing up. Add to that the insidious way he has continued to subvert the issue with his attempt to make part of the ACA opaque (the £25 per day allowance). The only thing transparent about Brown is his refusal to address the issue efficiently. The man is the most arrogant imbecilic fool to have held the role in the last.
Just as he is in no small part culpable for wrecking our economy, he is in no small part responsible for bringing our political system into greater disrepute than I can recall through his lack of leadership and his underlying self-serving, mendacious and arrogant dismissal of the views of the British public.
This could have been put to bed months ago as both Cameron and Clegg have demonstrated. Brown has been a roadblock to resolving this issue and it will drag on and on now until the public (and media sadly) get full satisfaction.
213 I suspect you are.
212 A “Jonathan party”, with Aitken too? Not bloody likely?
Been away from the tellybox and interwebthingymebob. Expenses round #2 - Oh FFS.
179 If Tim is right in conceding that Jacqui Smith lied about her main home, describing it as a travesty, surely Gordon Brown’s moral compass requires him as leader of the party to demand that the huge amounts she obtained as a result should be repaid and that she be disqualified from standing for re-election at the next GE. He would surely earn considerable respect for doing so.
Speaking of which, what are her local Labour selection committee doing in allowing her candidature to proceed?
141: Nick - wasn’t it your party which recently introduced retrospective taxation? Sauce for the goose and all that….
190/193. I expect Klaus will hold out for as long as he possibly can. When his position becomes untenable he can then look honestly his supporters in the eye and tell them he did all he could. I still very much doubt he can hold out for 8 months.
The EU *know* the implications if Lisbon is still unratified when Cameron wins in June and they will expedite any ‘concerns’ Klaus has as rapidly as possible to bring this to a head by Christmas.
What Cameron should do is to start talking *now* with other EU leaders about all the opt-outs and powers he isn’t happy with the EU possessing.
It’s already party policy to repatriate social and employment policy. I understand the common fisheries policy is one the Tories are unhappy with as well.
My main issues with Lisbon are the Charter of Fundamental Rights and the creation of an incipient EU foreign policy. I’d also make clear to the EU that Defence, Taxation and Foreign Policy were simply “no go” areas for the UK in the long-term. I’m not really comfortable with QMV on anything other than matters relating to the operation of the single market.
I couldn’t care less about the distribution of commissioners or whether the President is on a 6-month rotation or elected. A more powerful EU parliament is probably a good thing.
221 PfP - Tsk, you and I have bets on Redditch, so I guess we’re members of Tories for Jacqui Smith’s Candidacy!
Good on Nick Clegg
http://twitter.com/nick_clegg/status/4831073447
218 Roger. Try cutting your fingernails. It worked wonders for me.
225, aye. Clegg can sometimes show surprising sense (like over the Green business and Gurkhas).
WTF,
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/10/mcnulty-gets-nothing-to-repay-legg-letter.html
Lawyers don’t decide, Judges do.
by EdP October 13th, 2009 at 9:28 am
And where do we get judges from?
Yep, nice and cosy little but very profitable cartel isn’t it.
228 - Oh,
“Sir Thomas added that his findings did not deal with any payments under separate investigation by the Standards Commissioner.”
But we all know what the Standard Commissioner rulings are like!
210 Waster - I wish I could buy Sky for less than £100 or is that the monthly limit in order to obtain exemption, if so such arbitary limits are a joke - presumably the same would apply to, say, a £99.99 case of wine claimed every month. Btw, I wasn’t just referring to Sky Sports but to the entire subscription. After all, Sky News comes free of charge, care of Freeview.
229 Ooh, it’s all a conspiracy!!!
229 / 232 - http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/leading-articles/who-will-judge-the-judges-it-should-not-be-lord-irvine-of-lairg-640679.html
Widdecombe showing some spine as well on the retrospective stuff.
Clegg/Cameron/Brown are pathetic.
228. If that’s the case the Legg ‘audit’[sic] is an utter joke. It’s nothing more than another piece of arbitrary stupidity. How on earth can McNulty get away with it. It’s outrageous…..
223. He’s clever conflating the Lisbon issue with that of German irredentism; there’s hardly a more explosive issue in the Czech Republic than the latter.
Sitting across the border in Bavaria are hundreds of thousands of Sudeten Germans who have been surveying their lost estates with a greedy eye since the early 1990s….
234 tim - No, I think they are just bowing to the inevitable. Politically, they’ve got no choice but to accept what Legge has done, so they might as well do so quickly.
235 - As with Osborne, McNulty’s claims are under seperate investigation.
Legg covered claims not under investigation.
234 tim
The leaders have no choice - none at all. You have to pick your battles.
For once, Brown has done the right thing.
218. roger. Can you add something to the end of your username. Maybe an initial or something?
6 labour mp’s and a tory decide jacqui does not have to repay 116k she stole.
not an independent group of honest people with integrity, a decision by other (potentially) troughing mp’s.
PATHETIC and in my view close to corrupt in making this decision.
sets a pecedent, presumably for themselves to get away witrh it as well if they are guilty.
is it just me or should every penny be repaid with interest, every flip returned, every 2nd home that was not a second home repaid, and then we can find out if they are really there to “give” as cyclops says they should be.
they can give of course, give all the money they nicked back.
*** NEW THREAD ***238. Tim
Are you sure about that because hasn’t Osborne been asked for further information about his expenses? In anycase don’t the matters relating to the Osborne investigation pre-date the scope of the Legg audit?
This is part of the problem with the bureaucratic nightmare Brown has created. There are simply too many different people now running their own independent initiatives. As ever Brown makes something that is complex in anycase overly so because of his love of bureaucracy!
223. I agree, that Klaus may not be able to hold out until next election - more hope than expectation on my part - but he does seem quite determined. One wonders what else he has up his sleeve to delay proceedings.
As for the situation of the treaty being ratified, I’m afraid that the Tory policy then becomes meaningless twaddle.
Apart from the fact all opt-outs get eroded by the EU over time anyway and that the so-called red lines (herrings) in the Lisbon Treaty would leak like a sieve according to a select committee, there is a more fundamental problem - The ‘ratchet clause’
Article 48(7) means that the treaty becomes self amending, which would allow the EU to extend its powers further in the future, without having to draw up any new agreements, and this would allow it to override any opt-outs Cameron gets now
The only mistake Jaqui Smith made was not buying somewhere in London which was expensive enough to have meant her claiming the maximum mortgage allowance. Rather like Cameron did in the Cotswolds. The cost to taxpayer would have been the same. Both she and Cameron have a constituency outside London so surely in both cases London is where the subsisized home should have been sited?
that is complex in anycase and makes it overly so because of his love of bureaucracy!
245 - “Both she and Cameron have a constituency outside London so surely in both cases London is where the subsisized home should have been sited?”
Rubbish, and you know it. Don’t try to claim Cameron is somehow guilty of wrongdoing on this. The rules have always stated the second home can be either in the constituency or in London. Smith lying about which one is her second home is the issue here, and nothing else.
245. No. Jaquie Smith made several mistakes, one of them is she claimed that her sisters house was her main residence, and didnt live there, she then lied to the committee about it.
In any other sphere of life, private sector, public sector, military, such behaviour would result in instant dismissal, and a demand for immediate repayment, failure would result in both criminal and civil recovery.
If one of the people i represent, had lied on their housing benefit application forms, and their unemployment benefits, to deliberately make them eligible for something they knew they werent entitled, up to £100,000 would result in a custodial sentence.
JARHEAD - Day Seven
Timeline : Tuesday 13th April 2010. 6.58am.
Location : Room 213. Cotswold Plaza Hotel. Gloucestershire.
Dramatis Personae : Eric Pickles.
……………………………………………………
The full length cheval mirror had reflected many sights - pop stars sicking up the nights drug and drink binge, minor European royalty obliging the regions finest courtesans, notable criminals planning the next job but surely all pailed into insignificance compared to the sight that filled so amply the beveled glass.
Eric Pickles leaned nakedly over the edge of the Victorian paw footed bath. His equally paw-like hands swirled the warm scented water. Slowly and with purpose, magnificent with grace and a not a little effort the man mountain of the Conservative Party eased into the waves of the massive bath. Surely no greater displacement of water had occured sinced the newly commissioned Bismarck had slipped her chains and coarsed into the Kiel Canal.
“Fifteen minutes Mr Pickles” came the knock and shout from the corridor. The aide to the Conservative Party Chairman and General Election Supremo waited for a few moments and a few moments more. Darcy Peters rapped the door again. No reply. Slowly he opened the door to the suite and gingerly meandered in. Darcy heard faintly the noise of water and edged towards the vast en-suite. He coughed …. and again slightly more loudly and inched into the bathroom.
A vast eruption of water plastered Darcy and the room as the submerged Pickles surfaced in a wall of drained and scented flesh.
Pickles smirked and confronted the wet youth :
“Well lad, not seen a Tory heavyweight before ?? …. Briefing, come on briefing.”
The startled aide quickly gathered his wits. He had prepared the briefing for breakfast but it appeared that a towel wrapped and damp Chairman knew better.
“Overnight polls show us up twelve points in MORI and thirteen points in YouGov. The LibDems have moved up a couple of points in both. David wants the conference call with you and George Osborne brought foreward ten minutes. Your Today programme interview is confirmed at 8.10am and the media briefing is as scheduled at 9.10am.”
Pickles shot an approving look at Darcy. Smiled and ushered the young man out. “Breakfast, fifteen minutes” he shouted after the double first from Oxford.
Eric sat down on the immensely comfortable and deep winged chair. He was a happy man. Everything seemed to be sailing along well. Nothing seemed to be able to touch Cameron on his progress to 10 Downing Street. And here they were on the cusp of a West Country tour that would surely reap on election day a host of marginal Labour seats and not a few from the Liberal Democrats.
Still, time was pressing and Eric got up. The towels fell to the floor and the Conservative Party Chairman turned the key and opened the wardrobe. That reminded him, he needed to call Nick Soames. Eric turned round and faced the mirror. He chuckled. They said his bulk gave him bottom. Eric turned round and looked over his shoulder into the mirror. They were surely correct - What an arse !!
Eric had said of himself that he was a “fat man who liked westerns”. Well it was time to saddle up his horse, hit the dirt and drive the critters from town. Eric smiled, looked down and decided it was also high noon time to holster that pistol !! …. he got dressed.
JARHEAD - Day Seven
Timeline : Tuesday 13th April 2010. 6.58am.
Location : Room 213. Cotswold Plaza Hotel. Gloucestershire.
Dramatis Personae : Eric Pickles.
……………………………………………………
The full length cheval mirror had reflected many sights - pop stars sicking up the nights drug and drink binge, minor European royalty obliging the regions finest courtesans, notable criminals planning the next job but surely all pailed into insignificance compared to the sight that filled so amply the beveled glass.
Eric Pickles leaned nakedly over the edge of the Victorian paw footed bath. His equally paw-like hands swirled the warm scented water. Slowly and with purpose, magnificent with grace and a not a little effort the man mountain of the Conservative Party eased into the waves of the massive bath. Surely no greater displacement of water had occured sinced the newly commissioned Bismarck had slipped her chains and coarsed into the Kiel Canal.
“Fifteen minutes Mr Pickles” came the knock and shout from the corridor. The aide to the Conservative Party Chairman and General Election Supremo waited for a few moments and a few moments more. Darcy Peters rapped the door again. No reply. Slowly he opened the door to the suite and gingerly meandered in. Darcy heard faintly the noise of water and edged towards the vast en-suite. He coughed …. and again slightly more loudly and inched into the bathroom.
A vast eruption of water plastered Darcy and the room as the submerged Pickles surfaced in a wall of drained and scented flesh.
Pickles smirked and confronted the wet youth :
“Well lad, not seen a Tory heavyweight before ?? …. Briefing, come on briefing.”
The startled aide quickly gathered his wits. He had prepared the briefing for breakfast but it appeared that a towel wrapped and damp Chairman knew better.
“Overnight polls show us up twelve points in MORI and thirteen points in YouGov. The LibDems have moved up a couple of points in both. David wants the conference call with you and George Osborne brought foreward ten minutes. Your Today programme interview is confirmed at 8.10am and the media briefing is as scheduled at 9.10am.”
Pickles shot an approving look at Darcy. Smiled and ushered the young man out. “Breakfast, fifteen minutes” he shouted after the double first from Oxford.
Eric sat down on the immensely comfortable and deep winged chair. He was a happy man. Everything seemed to be sailing along well. Nothing seemed to be able to touch Cameron on his progress to 10 Downing Street. And here they were on the cusp of a West Country tour that would surely reap on election day a host of marginal Labour seats and not a few from the Liberal Democrats.
Still, time was pressing and Eric got up. The towels fell to the floor and the Conservative Party Chairman turned the key and opened the wardrobe. That reminded him, he needed to call Nick Soames. Eric turned round and faced the mirror. He chuckled. They said his bulk gave him bottom. Eric turned round and looked over his shoulder into the mirror. They were surely correct - What an arse !!
Eric had said of himself that he was a “fat man who liked westerns”. Well it was time to saddle up his horse, hit the dirt and drive the critters from town. Eric smiled, looked down and decided it was also high noon time to holster that pistol !! …. he got dressed.
In addition to ACA payments to relatives being a problem, does anyone know what line will be taken by Legg on sub letting properties to other MPs and party workers. It seems to me that the practise of money being claimed on second homes/flats and then those properties being rented out is wrong especially when the money is being recycled as well. Have some of the MPs used the extra money to buy a third property? Then there is the issue of the abuse of IEAs to pay for political leaflets. This too needs proper investigation, including the dates that the money was being spent eg spikes in taxpeyers money spent on mass letter writing on HoC headed paper in the few months before key elections (eg county council by-elections as well as GEs).