Why is there to be no ‘Legg style’ investigation into the expenses of members of the House of Lords?
I have blogged before on the expenses culture in the House of Lords.
The Sunday Times has now looked at some twenty peers whose expenses give rise to concern. The latest concerns those of Baroness Goudie – who has been claiming her first home as a flat in Glasgow. This despite having a London home with her QC husband in Belgravia.
Incidentally, once a ‘first home’ has been accepted, a peer can claim travel expenses (largely un-receipted) to and from that place, and spouses get six First Class rail tickets two and from per year.
Lord Paul has asked the House of Lords authorities to investigate his own £38,000 claim on an Oxfordshire flat in which he admits he has never slept. Lord Paul, a Labour peer of ‘non-dom’ status was allowed to become a member of the Privy Council in June of this year.
As for status – the Tory peer, Michael Ashcroft, is opaque about his status. Over the years there have been claims that he too is of ‘non-dom’ status. Both these peers are million pound plus donors to respectively the Labour and Tory Parties.
The sums of money involved in the Lords’ expenses scandal are very, very much larger than those in the Commons – yet there appears to be a determination not to investigate.
Is this because a number of those so far either named or currently being investigated by the media are, or have been, ministers?
The Telegraph reported yesterday that four peers are under police investigation over their expenses.
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I thought that you had two friends in the ‘House of Lords’ you will be popular.
We were not told of Thomas Legg’s intention prior to the Commons investigation.It is purely an assumption that no expenses scrutiny was not on the cards.
The planned next step may be the Lords.
For my part there are far more ,so called ‘legitimate ’scandals that are ongoing , with abuse being put forward as equality.
These people are just as bad as any crimminal or Terrorist. They epitomise true scum. They’re corrupt, greedy, arrogant, indifferent liars. They should be in prison like everyone else that fraudulates. How these bast***s get away from justice stands testiment to the scale of collusion within British politics/establishment. These are the same people who have hoodwinked the public for decades, brought us in illegal wars, caused hatreds and terrorism and, continue with impunity their arrogant corruption.
Great blog Jon. Keep up the pressure both online and on air.
How can anyone be a non dom and a memebr of the House of Lords? Do they and their spouses get free travel to their tax haven?
I’m now convinced we need central funding (not excessive) of parties with no outside donations allowed. That will limit their advertising and stop them being ‘bought’
There has never been a better opportunity to lance the boil of parliamentary excess once and for all. Maybe we should run the government advert for tax disc dodgers – we know where you are – recut to aim it at politicians.
An entirely legitimate requirement following the Sunday Times revelations. So many appointments to the Lords stem from cronyism that it’s hardly surprising that the porcine factor rules once the recipients take ermine!
And what a load of trough tripe that is too…why on earth should these recipients-of-political-expediency be refered to as Lord Mandelson or Baroness Warsi etc?
They have no greater reason to be admired than a million other Brits and no justification to be called anything more exalted than Mr. Ms or Mrs!
There is such a lot of accumulated wisdom amongst retired public servants, senior politicians of distinction, former members of the media and, indeed, former peers that we just don’t need to water down our upper chamber with these unelected, second rate chancers.
Hey Jon….You are one of the best around. I wouldn’t pester you on this website if I did not think that. Others realise that too.
We self sensor and thank goodness , because we would be letting far too much steam off and you would be picking up the anger. That would not be fair as you have given us this opportunity to express those things which “stir” us.
We ALL side with Claudia Winkleman as well.
Margaret: good point. We all(try) to self-censor, and I think deep-down we rely on some clear-water irony from the people who run blogs.
What annoys me is when journalists rage against bloggers, when they’ve got loads of sub-editors/editors/lawyers behind them. We haven’t, and I think by and large we’re doing quite well.
censor
I think it could all rather obvious to draw some conclusions why these expenses have had a blind eye turned to them if one of your fine people in the C4 Newsroom could put together a nice Excel spreadsheet of all the known facts about these people and then make some observations of how their expenses claims match their importance to the party they are affiliated to.
I for one would love to see who has , for instance ,given the least and most financial support to their respective party and then who has claimed the most during their time in the Lords. I cant help but wonder what the correlation will be.
Maybe it’ll put the “cash for honours” thing a while back ,right down the scandal ratings!
Hopefully, the exposure of more flagrant expenses abuse in the Lords will hasten their replacement by a Senate consisting of 300, geographically-based, elected Senators, each serving 5 years, but with 20% of them facing re-election each year and a maximum of three terms served. That way, the Upper House can reflect dynamic changes in society, whilst also maintaining some continuity and democratic ‘constituency’ pressure on the Senators. Is that so hard and difficult ?
I haven’t read the Sunday Times story and this article is new to me – but the reason for investigation inertia is feel somehwere here-http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/1524142/Blair-admits-link-between-party-donations-and-seats-in-Lords.html
Lords expenses scandal? If it did come out, it would be quickly brushed under the carpet. I personally haven’t followed this latest scandal but then again I don’t think I would give it much of my attention anyway.
There are far more important things to focus on and subsequently resolve…
Remember, a Lord is a Lord, bit like a Senatore a Vita in Italia who can’t be prosecuted for crimes they have committed during their political careers.
Giulio Andreotti ring any bells? One of the biggest political mafiosi of modern times together with Silvio of course….
adzmundo CND
I don’t know what to think actually. I’m sure there have been some abuses in the Lords, but I would also like to think that the majority of the “Great” are also “good”
JS: exactly. There was someone on Radio 4 saying because they’re unpaid they deserve massive expenses(or words to that effect).
Surely, if a would-be Lord or Lord-ett knows they’ll be unpaid servants of a democracy’s legislature, they should either say “fair enough” or “get stuffed”.
Either it’s an-honour-in-and-of-itself or it’s something-they-can-live-without.
Isn’t it strange? They want the prestige, but they also want the cash.
Whatever happened to the inquiry on the Lords who would ask questions for cash. They were exposed by newspaper reporters going undercover and taping their conversations.
Probably yet another inquiry the powers that be hope we will forget!
That is the whole crux of the problem. Over the last 15 years GB has had a taste of corruption which we havn’t experienced before , with a consistent motif of denial, as firms, social structure,
institutions crumble and are duped before our eyes.
My local vicar tells of congregations feeling as though life had become a living hell for all Brits.
Kids talk of ’syncing.’.. synchronicity.. as though doubling up was a normal way of life.
The majority of people can’t see the Great or the Good any more, if it exists or ever did.
David Cameron says that “we are all in this together” … so it follows that we Must all be under the eye of transparency and prove that we are all in this together and explain why many highly qualified people are living below the breadline and those with hardly any qualifications are in top positions.
We learnt about MPs abusing the system and when caught out, they said they ‘acted within the rules’.
Next step was to admit the rules should be stricter. (And it took media to find that out for them..).
Then came THE Investigation which resulted in making the ‘lesser’ criminals pay back. All the ‘flipping’ big thieves had to do was – to say “Sorry”!
We saw Bonus Bankers stir up angry feelings which resulted in all sorts of investigative actions, various sackings and new policies.
But – again… we see huge bonuses being paid out when the rest of us are struggling to make ends meet.
And – how many of the old, ‘bad’ bankers are still on the boards today?
And then, as you rightfully point out – there’s the House of Lords. Words can not describe how I feel about this. GIven the failure of previous MP and ‘banker’ investigations… it would be easy to give up on this as well. After all, what’s the point? The whole Westminster culture needs to be radically changed, Westminster windows opened wide to let fresh air through.
We should demand an investigation – and definitely not give up.
This is why people will end up voting BNP. The Labour & Conservative Parties have delivered the biggest corruption, demise , poverty & hatred causing in the UK than any other government. The BNP would struggle to get anywhere near the scale of these Economy & Society Terrorists.
isnt it strange that where ever there is power there is abuse. in the case of the lords/commons it is expenses . this also probably is the case with councils , but to me the major abuse of power are the people we elect to serve us that build empires and think they are above the normal people. Animal farm is very apt
Jon Snow seems like a reasonable sorta chap, not a closet fascist
So why is it that there is no sense of alarm about our descent into a totalitarian dictatorship Jon????
Surely the solution is to press charges of fraud? Even if the trials proceeded on the old basis before a jury of 39 peers, this would make for some interesting theatre. More seriously these obvious fiddles compounded by the bizarre ruling by the Clerk risk bringing the House of Lords into disrepute. I do not recall that the Magna Carta ran to many definitions, but has proved intelligible.
Apart from any other consideration the amounts were so ridiculously petty in relation to the income or assets of some of the offenders, that one has to wonder why they bothered
Again as in the ‘Commons’ the way matters are discussed in the’ Lords’ are superior in that arguments are reasonable, rationale ( yet not excluding those peripheral arguments which may impact on streamlined versions of an argument) and sympathetic.
The lofty attitude is inbred , however the discourse and polemic is worth more respect than the offensive language which is brandished at them in a venomous way.
Lords please continue to be sensible and resist against hot headed revolt, whch because of it’s violent nature makes me fear of a future which has no self control
of course the Lords should be excused as they are no longer the so called “upper class” born with a silver spoon in their mouth.Now they are the poor ordinary man/woman plucked from obscurity to do their parties wishes.What more can you expect from such people but a bit of corruption. “wink wink”
Jon
I have a lot of respect for you but really it seems to me that it is for you, the media, to ask these questions and to keep asking them on our behalf until you get an answer. I know it is like knocking your head against a brick wall but rest assured we are behind you all of the way.
There does seem a real dirth of investigative journalists in the print world. Panorama Despatches etc. are fine but necessarilly time restricted and end up metaphorically as yesterday’s chip paper.
What is happeninng with Legg, the Lords Kelly etc. etc. is frankly beyond parody and I have to wonder if there is some master plan to totally ruin our democracy to support the push for Europe?
I think enough has been said re all these expenss scandals – so there are corrupt politicians – big surprise – waht they get away with is peanuts compared to waht the big capitalits get away with – is it not time that some reporting was done on them – and their expolots – or are they beyond reach ?.
Conservative MP Eleanor Laing has been endorsed by her party to stand as candidate despite not paying capital gains tax on the sale of two properties on which she had claimed public money.
In what is an obvious admission of guilt, Mrs Laing has “voluntarily” repaid £25,000 to the public purse after her neat little earner was exposed.
According to newspaper reports, Mrs Laing had received her party’s “overwhelming backing.” She said was “delighted” at the outcome of a vote taken at a recent constituency meeting on the matter where 83 percent of her party’s organisation voted to keep her on as MP.
Mrs Laing did not pay £180,000 capital gains tax on the sale of two Westminster flats, on which she made a £1 million profit.
She and her now ex-husband bought the first flat in 1993 and purchased the next door flat in 2002, turning them into one large property. When she sold them both in 2008, she told the tax authorities that they were her principal residence when they were actually designated her second home for expenses purposes.
Why isn’t she in jail?
Clive: she’s not in jail because the Parliamentary Expenses People were never intended to be serious. It wasn’t even half-cocked.
The good news is that(call me naive) they’ll never be able to get-away-with(or even propose) these shenanigans ever again. It’s sad that Cromwell’s idea of clear governance took a few centuries to be taken seriously, but I think(hope) we’ve now finally seen the end of Restoration ‘democracy’.
Stuff is serious.
Looks as though you’ve rattled a cage, Jon. I see they are about to get new rules.
Still think there should be a thorough investigation into past expenses, similar to the MPs’
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