Friday, May 15, 2009 

Off with their heads?

A week on from the start of the Telegraph's disclosures, and you would have thought that this would be a perfect time to begin to take stock and see how just how badly the brand of politics in general has been damaged, to take the analogy to breaking point. Yet still the story rolls on, although whether the law of diminishing returns has started to kick in yet is difficult to ascertain. Tomorrow the Telegraph, after claiming the first ministerial scalp today in Shahid Malik is set to target a Lib Dem and this blog's favourite member of parliament, Ms Nadine Dorries, who has already put up a spirited defence of herself on her blog. It's hard not to fall victim to schadenfreude, seeing two of the most downright unpleasant specimens (the other being Hazel Blears) in the Commons having to defend themselves not against accusations of being terrible politicians, which is beyond dispute, but of financial impropriety.

As always when "crisis" descends, it's easy to lose perspective. The anger which has been expressed over the past week will subside, that much is certain. Few can sustain such fury as that expressed on phone-ins and last night's cathartic edition of Question Time for such a period of time. Again, the key period to look back to for indicators of what might happen next is the last days of the Major government, but although the allegations then were far more serious than involving "petty" abuse of expenses, there was an opposition party which was felt to be on the verge of being a viable alternative, if it was not already, as well as being one which was unblemished by the scandals. This time round, although David Cameron has put in as strong a performance as could be expected by someone who knows that he has much to potentially gain from putting the government's response to shame, his own party is only marginally less, if not as culpable as the government itself. It remains the fact that the biggest rage is being directed towards the "flippers" and profiteers, such as the previously sainted Ms Blears, but no one watching Question Time could fail to note that all politicians are taking a beating.

All of this was completely avoidable. The most mystifying thing is that a week on, parliament still refuses to get everything out in the open now and end the steady corrosion which only gets worse the longer the drip, drip of revelations continues. Second only to that has been the ineptness of Labour's attempts to get a grip on the situation, almost making you wonder whether they've completely lost all hope, both in themselves and in their chances of coming anything higher than 4th in the European elections. After all, if Shahid Malik has to stand down while his claims are investigated, why on earth are Hazel Blears and Jacqui Smith still in the cabinet, regardless of their denials and in the former's case, the brandishing of cheques? The answer might well be that they're already doomed in the next reshuffle, but the way things are going you almost wonder whether there is going to be a next reshuffle: perhaps it ought to be better to get everything over with now and call an election, rather than wait for the anger to turn instead into apathy and mistrust which will be unshiftable for years to come.

There is an argument to be made, amidst all of this, for less of a reactionary response, perhaps most forcefully made by Martin Kettle, even if his blaming of the press doesn't fully wash. Pushed down the agenda, for instance, have been examples of genuine, old style Tory corruption, only by Labour peers in the Lords. Both Lord Truscott and Lord Taylor are likely to be suspended from "the other place" after they were investigated following the Sunday Times' entrapment operation in January. Petty personal enrichment and bending if not breaking of the rules looks squeaky clean and understandable compared to the boasts made by both men of what they could do in exchange for money in the old fashioned brown envelopes. Why, also, do we not reserve such fury for the £40 million which the monarchy costs us every year, to far fewer individuals for far less work while they really do live in the lap of luxury? It also reflects badly on what it seems the public really cares about: the hate expressed over the past week seems far beyond anything that was displayed at the time of the Iraq war, when life itself was cheap to leading politicians. Some of it undoubtedly boils down to pure envy, but how on earth can that be criticised when Labour's record both on poverty has been shown to be so dismal, and now when so many are having to make do on £64 a week? On more sure ground is the hypocrisy and cant of the newspapers themselves, especially of the Mail, Telegraph and Times/Sun, all of whom are owned by individuals who are either tax exiles or do their best to avoid paying their fair share while demanding that everyone else play by the rules in the most sickening, hectoring manner.

None of the above however will make any difference for the moment, such is the apparent momentum behind the story. The fear expressed by some that this could end up turning into a "Clean Hands" style affair such as that which took place in Italy in the early 90s are probably overblown, but there is little doubt that even if there are no suicides, some now seem likely to lose their seats. The irony in all this is that while our political system is rotten in so many ways, whether down to party tribalism, whipping, or fear of offending the real power in the land, it seems likely to be the moats, trouser presses and swimming pool repairs which bring it back down to earth. In the end, we will all end up the losers in a who can wear the hairiest shirt contest, and change which fails to tackle the real problems, such as the change offered by David Cameron, will turn out be just as illusionry as that offered by New Labour.

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Monday, May 11, 2009 

The Nuremberg defence and democracy following it.

In The Thick of It, probably the closest television has come to getting close to the reality of being an MP since Yes Minister, the politicians are almost uniquely portrayed not as venal, corrupt or stupid, although Hugh Abbott is certainly close to being incompetent, but caught in-between the spin doctors, the media and the public at large, all of whom are shown in a far more negative light. From the outraged woman who wants to know what Abbott is going to do about how she has to clean up her own mother's piss, to those who leave insults on the Conservative MP's blog about his sexual predilection for cats, you can't help but feel sorry for the MPs who work incredibly long hours only to be abused by all and sundry around them.

Sadly for the few honourable members who have not made outlandish expenses claims, and there are indeed some who haven't, it's now going to be a long time before anyone feels sorry for the political class as a whole. If things seemed bad when the Telegraph first unleashed the leaked disc sold to them for around a six figure sum on Friday, on Monday night, with still more abuses to be revealed tomorrow and presumably over the coming days, it's the continuous drip drip which is now in danger of doing lasting, long standing damage not just to this parliament, but potentially to democracy itself for some time to come.

The last time parliament felt under siege like this was when there seemed to be "sleaze" stories concerning the last Conservative government emerging week by week. This went from the highly serious, concerning Neil Hamilton and Jonathan Aitken to the sex "scandals" which we have since rather stopped putting so much importance on. The difference was that these were almost uniquely affecting the Conservatives, and New Labour was doing its utmost to gain from them. No one is pretending now that any party has been more "pure" than the others, although it remains to be seen whether the Lib Dems and the nationalist parties (Sinn Fein apart) will have as many apparently on the take in their ranks as the two main parties seem to. The cliché used to be that it was the Conservatives caught with their trousers down, while with Labour it was money. Despite a recent Daily Mail story that suggested that the expenses would reveal affairs and that Labour whips were on suicide watch, such was the fear of what was to come among some on the backbenches, it now seems to be money, or rather claiming both for property and for the furniture to fill it that dazzles all.

If anything, some of the claims by the Conservative frontbench look worse than that of their Labour counterparts. Some are defending Michael Gove from the accusation that he was one of the politicians who "flipped" his second home, but claiming £7,000 for furniture still leaves a bad taste in the month when you consider that Gove has not just the one salary, but undoubtedly another if not others, continuing to write a column for the Times, serving on the board of the hilarious Standpoint magazine, often appearing on Newsnight Review and also writing the equally laughable Celsisus 7/7, which makes Melanie Phillips' Londonistan look like a paragon of research by comparison. Andrew Lansley, who appeared recently on Question Time and let everyone know that he earns £24,000 a year for 12 days' work serving as a corporate director on the board of a company, renovated a Tudor cottage on expenses, sold it, then switched his second home to a flat in London. Francis Maude, another man with lucrative secondary income, tried claiming mortgage interest.

Apart from John Prescott claiming for two toilet seats and panelling for the front of his house, Barbara Follett (another hardly impoverished individual considering she's married to the novelist Ken Follett) claiming £20,000 for security, Margaret Moran with her second home in Southampton, because without it she wouldn't be able to see her husband who works there, Hazel Blears seems to the Labour MP most deserving of having ordure thrown at her, with both Sunny and the Heresiarch outlining in detail exactly why. Not only did she "flip" her second home three times in one year, claim furniture for them and then apparently avoid paying capital gains tax when she sold one of the properties, earning herself a tidy £45,000 profit, but she is the most prominent individual who seems to find the whole scandal to be frivolous; it isn't her fault, it's the system, she intones, all the while beaming in the same crooked smile which never seems to leave her face. Even today's Guardian leader, having described Blears in such beaming terms just last Monday, suddenly finds that she perhaps isn't the "decent, well-motivated and genuine" person it thought she was. It is of course nice to find that those MPs whom we most love to loathe for their loyalty and lack of independence are not just lacking intellectually but also in the honesty stakes, but those who aren't guilty, such as the Ed Milibands, Alan Johnsons, Philip Dunnes and David Howarths will be dragged down with them.

Although the politicians themselves have been pointing towards them by means of creating a distraction, there is no doubt whatsoever that those most likely to benefit from parliament as a whole being dragged through the mire are the extremists, and the British National Party must be regarding the Telegraph stories as manna from heaven, coming so close to the European elections when they were already likely to do well. How can any party, not just Labour or the Conservatives, try and campaign on the actual issues while this is going on? True, most might just declare a plague on all their houses and not vote at all in what would already be a low turnout election, but the worry must now be that those seats which the BNP could potentially grasp are now theirs for the taking.

The one thing that is abundantly clear is that the politicians themselves can now no longer have any control over their own expenses or their salaries. That not a single one of the 47 MPs named so far by the Torygraph was willing to go on Newsnight to defend themselves was just not a display of cowardice, it was also that they know they simply can't blame a system and not apportion blame on themselves as well. The new regime will have to be overseen by a completely independent committee, otherwise faith in parliament might never return. The second home allowance has to be scrapped altogether, or at least far more heavily policed or regulated, as does the John Lewis list. Those earning £64,000 or more a year simply cannot expect the taxpayer to furnish their homes for them. The tax breaks also have to be ended.

One of the few boasts that could be made about our political system was that compared to some of our European neighbours, not to mention the banana republics and kleptocracies around the globe, ours was remarkably free of corruption, and when it comes to out and out buying of votes, or payments for policies, that still mostly holds true. No one could have predicted that it would be bath plugs and bags of manure which would bring politics into such disrepute, but now that it's happened the shovels have to be brought out. The worst culprits need to be held to account in some way, and as the only way might well be the ballot box itself, there's now even more reason than ever to vote tactically. Ensuring that the likes of Hazel Blears and Michael Gove are not MPs in around a year's time might well be the only way we can hope to restore parliament to even a shadow of its former standing.

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Monday, March 30, 2009 

Richard Timney and the story of his descent into perversion.

The Sunday Express is not often noted for its political scoops, and coming shortly after its Scottish sister thought it was a spiffing idea to lead with the shame of the Dunblane survivors who were daring to act like teenagers generally do, their story on Jacqui Smith's husband claiming expenses for watching two "pornographic" features must be a cause for double satisfaction. For not only did they beat their rivals, but it also seems likely that Richard Timney was also contributing to Richard Desmond's coffers, having probably ordered the features from his Television X venture. A Telegraph blogger claims that the films in question were Raw Meat 3, which it turns out, is of the gay genre, and By Special Request, which is undetermined in nature at present.

If almost any other politician, or rather their spouse had been caught in a similar situation, with the possible exception of Harriet Harman, who the tabloids loves to portray as a feminazi, it wouldn't have probably been so embarrassing or have led to calls for their resignation. This though was unfortunate enough to befall Jacqui Smith, who seems to be have become the latest New Labour Home Secretary to gain the description "accident prone". No one could begrudge a spouse feeling lonely of an evening with their partner away the comfort of a surrogate, and as we know, Smith seems to spend an awful lot of time with her sister, and if they wish to sample adult entertainment to fill the void, as it were, even of the soft pornographic variety available on demand, that is no business of anyone else's. It would be best however if they didn't then claim it on their expenses. Yet to misquote Lady Bracknell, to be caught out once even if no explicit rule has been breached by claiming that your main residence also happens to be your sister's, to be caught out again in such a further shamefacedly way looks like carelessness.

In fact, the claiming of £10 for two half-hearted skin flicks looks remarkably less objectionable when you examine the list for what Smith was claiming in full, which includes, incredibly, a whole 88 pence for a bath plug, not to mention £550 for a Habitat stone model sink. Those who currently find themselves out of work and on jobseeker's allowance would have to save up for two months' and a week (the current rate is £60.50 a week if you're over 25, if you're under it's less) to be able to fit out their bathroom in the same manner. You can't help but think it would have been preferable for Timney to have emerged, crimson and contrite, to say sorry for the fitting out of their home at taxpayer's expense, especially when both are already in the pay of the state and hardly shabbily remunerated, than for him to have face the feral beast in full cry about his masturbatory habits.

Even with all of this in mind, probably the most outrageous statement made since yesterday's revelations has been the repeated claim, by both David Miliband and the prime minister, that Jacqui Smith is doing a "great job". She may be, as Hopi Sen half-heartedly says, decent and hard-working, and might also be a lovely person in general, it's just a crying shame about her politics and more than apparent difficulty to take criticism. It has to be remembered that this was the person who was determined, along with the prime minister, to ram through 42 days detention without charge for terrorist suspects, who recently oversaw the passing of the "dangerous pictures" law, and who now also wants to put through a successor "dangerous cartoons" act. Her contempt for individual liberty could not be more clear than when she when sneers at those that are "reasonably comfortable" but who complain about the erosion of civil liberties when far more important is the "fundamental right" for us "to be safe", and I say all this as someone reasonably sympathetic towards the way the media has portrayed her, from Quentin Letts leering at her bosom (not "pneumatic", friends of Ms Harman have accused me of misogyny) when she made the heinous mistake of inadvertently showing off some cleavage, to the oh so clever cartoonist in Private Eye who draws her with breasts the size of watermelons.

In fairness to Smith, while her claiming that her main residence is her sister's home is especially cunning, most MPs are doing things remarkably similar, regardless of their politics. The Sunday Mirror for instance claimed that William Hague, who is not exactly strapped for cash, was claiming for his second home despite earning in the region of £800,000 a year, and who wouldn't give up his outside interests despite being asked by Cameron. It's been apparent now for quite some time that to all intents and purposes, for those who want to abuse the system, even if they are not breaking the letter of the law, they can claim pretty much anything they want and not have to break into their own salary. At long last, possibly thanks to how bad this looks while everyone else is tightening their belts, Gordon Brown did today finally suggest that the second home allowance should be scrapped, despite only recently fending off attempts by others to reform the system, even if it will be replaced by a flat-rate system.

The rage that this is inducing in the public was palpably summarised on last week's Question Time, when Eric Pickles, who didn't help matters by putting off a poor defence of his allowance, was pulverised by the audience. This can be unfair on politicians who do often, it must be said, make the best of a bad lot. We ought to be grateful that for the most part ours are remarkably straight; far more worthy of criticism is the parliamentary system itself, where party comes above the personal all too often, as indeed is the first past the post system by which they are appointed in the first place. If you had to ask which was preferable, the fiddling of expenses so they can refit their bathrooms and get DVD players and widescreen TVs for their second homes for zilch, or the active buying or bribing of politicians by outside influences, you would go for the former every time. The sad fact is that most of them don't have to be paid to make bad decisions, whether on war, airport expansion or the bailing out of bankers: they do that more than acceptably all on their own.

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Friday, July 18, 2008 

Investigative blogging, the Tories and watching the ministerial written statements.

A whole load of investigative blogging has been going on of late, especially over at the Ministry. Unity first uncovered that one of the individuals who officiated on the employment tribunal in the case of Ladele vs Islington shares a name with a person who was previously the chairman of governors at an independent Catholic girls' school, quite obviously a potential conflict of interest when ruling on matters of discrimination involving a registrar refusing to officiate on civil partnerships.

Next, in response to the Charity Commission report on the Smith Institute, which although critical did not find the smoking gun that Guido amongst others hoped it would over its connections to Gordon Brown, Unity raises the question of Policy Exchange and its extreme closeness to Cameron and co, which bears much of a resemblance to that which the Smith Institute has been criticised over. While trying to gain full advantage from the report, Guido happens to link to the Centre for Open Politics, which models itself on the American Sunlight Foundation. Their gambit is:

Our work is inspired by and based on the work of the Sunlight Foundation in Washington D.C. We are committed to helping voters, bloggers and journalists be their own watchdogs, by improving access to existing information and digitising new information, and by creating new tools and websites to enable all of us to collaborate in fostering greater transparency.

Underlying all of Sunlight’s efforts is a fundamental belief that increased transparency will improve the conduct of politics itself and the public’s confidence in the political process.

All well and good, you might think; more transparency in politics is exactly what we need. You would expect however that those who have set-up this Centre for Open Politics would be, well open about their politics and transparent in their reasons for setting it up. The slightest Googling by Unity, and amazing as it may seem, it turns out that COP's founders, Harry Cole and Amanda O'Brien are respectively formerly Vice Chairman/Treasurer of the Edinburgh University Conservative Association, as well as running some of the recruitment drive for the youth Tory organisation Conservative Future, while O'Brien is likely to be the same Amanda O'Brien who's currently the deputy chairman of Essex Conservative Future. What's more, the domain name for COP's is registered at the self-same building out of which MessageSpace operates, which just so also happens to be associated with Guido.

Elsewhere meanwhile Cameron's decision to publish the expenses of the vast majority of his MPs might well backfire after it was noted that 78 of them are using their allowances to pay for the party's "Parliamentary Resources Unit", the Labour equivalent of which MPs have to pay for out of their own pockets. The Tories are on the defensive and confident they'll be found not to be breaching any rules, but John Mann has asked the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards to investigate.

Even more interesting for those of us keeping an eye on the habitual liar and fantasist which is Nadine Dorries is that her expenses show that she spent £2,938 on the services of Media Intelligence Partners. As Tim on Bloggerheads notes, the services provided by MIP are Media strategy', 'Media relations', 'Crisis management', 'Media Training', 'Public relations and political consultancy', 'Identity management' and 'Analysis and research'. According to the Green Book rules on what can and cannot be charged to the taxpayer, expenditure under the Incidental Expenses Provision is not permitted for "Advice for individual Members on self promotion, or PR for individuals or political parties." Dorries used taxpayer cash on MIP during her campaign for the abortion limit to be cut to 20 weeks. Could it be that she's been caught bang to rights yet again misusing her expenses, after previously using Commons notepaper inappropriately and funding her website also from the IEP?

Finally, Matt Wardman brings our attention to the government's usual habit of flooding out written ministerial statements just before parliament goes into recess and the silly season begins in earnest. Well worth watching.

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