The revolving door hit Brussels today.
As I have been nagging for Britain on this for the past three years I was invited to the hearing in the International Press Centre today.
The most curious recent British cases are the happy one of Gordon Brown giving £250,000 to charity - all of his additional earnings - and the curious claims about Peter Mandelson and Ann Taylor. I am sure the latter two have done nothing wrong. It's an interesting contrast with Brown's three predecessors. Tony Blair had made £20 million and gave away £4 million to charity. John Major had made a lot of money in the USA and Maggie Thatcher had a lucrative post with a tobacco company.
It was claimed this morning that Peter Mandelson has set up a special company to receive the royalties of his book. All legal, I'm sure. The question asked this morning is whether these monies were deductible for the full salary that Euro Commissioners are paid for three years after they stop being Commissioners. It's an intriguing question but no clear answer emerged. I am still slightly shell shocked on the fabulous deal that Euro Commissioners enjoy. Even those who do not write books.
It was an odd decision of former Defence Minister Ann Taylor to take a job with Thalys. The French company won contracts for £1.5 billion as part of the £5 billion to build the two aircraft carriers. This is a tad embarrassing. The new Government wanted to cancel the contracts. They failed because the negotiations of the deal make it more expensive to cancel than to continue. Thus we will be in the ludicrous position of having two spanking new aircraft carriers but we will not be able to afford any aircraft to put on them. Who negotiated that deal? I am sure it was not Ann. If she was involved she would not have taken a job with Thalys.
Next week the Public Administration Committee will have the chair of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments before us. The last time he was a witness he complained to a reporter afterwards about a question I had asked him. I said that we need a wholly independent person divorced from politics to head the committee. Why not a former bus driver or a waitress? The chairman did not think this was a sensible idea. He does not know that I spent years working as busman and I married a waitress. We could both make a fair stab on this job.
Thanks IPSA.
Not often I can say that. Dealing with them has been a screaming nightmare of incomprehensible bureaucracy. The figures published today seem to prove that they owe me a large amount of money. I am double checking the details.
The published figures demonstrate my modest claims and reassert the accolade given to me by the Daily Telegraph as an 'Expenses Angel.'
It was a great day when he discovered that speech could be used for narrative.
Posted by: Meizitang Capsules | February 18, 2012 at 05:06 PM