Sleaze multiplication.
In the past three weeks two Government Ministers have told me that we should trust politicians because they are honourable. That is what created the expenses scandal. The trust was misplaced then and it is now. Have we learnt nothing?
Culture Minister Mark Harper confessed that the Government could impose no penalties on revolving door ministers who lobby within two years of leaving office. But we should trust them. Francis Maude was aghast in defending the right of retiring ministers to have extensive paid 'gardening leave' when they leave office. He scolded me at the suggestion that some former ministers could clean up by hawking their contacts-book to the highest bidder.
This used to be situation. ‘MPs are honourable’ I was informed when I started in 1987. They would never do anything that was dishonest. Had there been a prize for pomposity in 1993 David Ashby MP would have won it out-right for his opposition to the Labour debate on sleaze in party funding. He said, ‘Let us have an end to all this mudslinging. Allegations have been raised about the Sultan of Brunei. We do not accept money from foreign governments or from families of foreign rulers. Those are the standards of this House’.
Labour MP Gordon Prentice intervened from a sedentary position, uncomfortably raising the spectre of a current Tory scandal, ‘What about Michael Mates?’ Former Northern Ireland minister Michael Mates had resigned earlier that year over his alleged links with the fugitive tycoon Asil Nadir. David Ashby revealed all the self-satisfied complacency of that era in his reply. ‘The honourable gentleman is a newcomer to this House. I have been here for ten years and I can tell him that being a MP carries great dignity. Our word is our bond.’ On that deluded foundation a tottering empire of sleaze prospered. It took more than another 16 years to dislodge it.
Maude and Harper naively preached the message of ‘trust the politician’ because now the stables have been cleansed. Except since the General Election:
* Bell Pottinger boasting that it can sell access to the Prime Minister.
* Tory treasurer Cruddas offering access to the PM for £250,000.
* Ignoring Ministerial Code in Fox, Werrity, Pickles and Hunt cases.
* New doctrine of absolution by resignation. Resign – and escape inquiry.
* No progress on promised Lobbying reforms-weak solution likely.
* Watering down of Wright reforms to strengthen powers of whips.
* The Mate-tocracy of Politicos, Press and Police of Murdoch scandal.
* Abusing Honours system to advance political stunt of 'The Big Society.'
This little gem turned up today on former Tory MP Paul Goodwin's website:
"Mr Hilton was also accused of being unprofessional: turning up at the meeting in shorts and a T-shirt, clutching a plastic bag full of oranges. As the meeting went on, Mr Hilton is said to have started "inexpertly" peeling an orange, getting juice all over the 'crotch of his brushed cotton shorts' ". That last detail was a low blow, but you get the picture. Every radical will sympathise with Mr Hilton. There are parts of the government machine that simply don't work. The Border Agency, anyone? Defence procurement? The Child Support Agency? Tax credits (overpayments and underpayments)? The NHS IT programme?
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