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The news that Peter Hain has quit the Cabinet, after his deputy leader campaign donations are referred to the Met Police, should give pause to those who place personal ambition over concerns about influence-peddling.
It also means that politicians should take more care over the choice of people to run their administrations.
There did seem to have been a trend towards US-style big money campaigns in British politics. Nick Clegg's and Chris Huhne's combined spending of over £160,000 on the recent leadership campaign may be less than US equivalents, but must be well over what was considered seemly for previous Liberal and Liberal Democrat contests. (It should be added that there is no whiff of impropriety over the donations to either the Clegg or Huhne campaigns.)
Two immediate questions come to mind as a result of today's news: who is going to be the new Welsh Secretary?; and will Mr Hain's resignation be the first domino in a sequence of leading Labour figures whose careers have been threatened by allegations of sleaze?
17:30The new Welsh Secretary will be Paul Murphy, MP for Torfaen, who has filled the post before. Although he is said to be not totally enthusiastic about the Government of Wales Act, he was the unsung hero of the talks in Northern Ireland leading to the Good Friday Agreement. His diplomatic skills will be much needed at Gwydr House.
Frank Little
5 comments:
Hain can now go to the Back Benches; and work on his tan, while Paul Murphy wouldn't be my first choice, at least it isn't Huw Irranca-Davies.
Well, it now looks as if Alan Johnson is now being investigated also. This has to stop. It is now bordering on the ridiculous.
I have never known such incompetence. These people are running major Government Departments.
Alan Johnson is the last member of the current cabinet one would have suspected of knowingly accepting dodgy donations. There is clearly a culture of concealment, from party members as much as from the public, in New Labour.
It should be emphasised that few, if any, of the donations would be regarded as criminal if Labour themselves had not made them so. One wonders what money was made available to Labour members in secret before the PPERA.
It would seem that the only major political party in "Westminster" politics (better qualify that before I set the Welsh Nationalists off again)! that has not been marred by some kind of sleaze over the past couple of weeks is the Liberal Democrats.
Could it be that we have actually got our Ship in order? I touch wood!
- Richie Northcote
You can be pretty sure that Labour and Conservative researchers have been poring over LibDem MPs' declarations with the aim of a tit-for-tat killing. (I had a look at Clegg and Huhne's donors to make sure there were no nasty surprises.)
It looks as if all our people have been upholding the party's reputation.
From this position of strength, Duncan Borrowman has had partial success in his campaign against Derek Conway, but is still going for his immediate removal.
Frank Little
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