>It will interesting to see what the Thunderdragon says when he comes back from his two weeks holiday. I’m not going to second guess him, though.

He has now said something, here:

http://thethunderdragon.co.uk/2008/08/ian-oakley-guilty.html

Extract (OK, nearly all of it):

What he has done is completely unacceptable. And he deserves what he gets for it. Unlike Asp, a contributor to this blog, who wrote a post on this subject whilst I was on holiday, I am certainly not “left with the classic comment “So what?”.” What he has done is so very very wrong. It would be wrong is he wasn’t a politician and these actions had been done for any other reason, and is abhorrent because it was done for political reasons. He has effectively attempted to subvert democracy.

He has already lost any chance of a political career, and faces a jail term. And also appears to be facing questions over his psychological state.

I fully support the idea of a full inquiry into this. Nothing less can be done. But the very idea that by-elections should be held for three local councillor positions won by Watford Conservatives since 2006 is ridiculous. It is not worth the cost of the by-elections, considering the massive Lib Dem majority on the council it certainly is not affecting their ability to make decisions. Really, the hate campaign failed since the Lib Dems certainly weren’t adversley affected by it.

Ian is not someone I thought would – or could – have done these disgusting things. Unfortunately we are all wrong sometimes, and I was this time. Ian will get his just desserts.

you say that the Watford LibDems have a sense of closure from the guilty plea and his conviction, but I disagree that this will be felt if at all, until the matter of all the complaints are cleared up.

Ian Oakley admitted only half of the incidents. The other half remain unaccounted for.

I’m afraid I feel our Conservative friends are in denial. This sort of behaviour is not as untypical as they would have themselves believe. If they truly want to be the natural party of government again, they must get their house in order quickly. The responsibility for this lies with their professional Agents and Organisers who have become far too willing to win at any cost. Including that of Democracy.

Why did they not immediately take action when he decided to resign from the Tory party? The “special allowances” he is currently drawing could have been stopped immediately if they felt obliged. It hasn’t been

My understanding is that immediately after Ian Oakley’s arrest Conservative Central Office were not informed of events until contacted by the press. By the time officials did get in touch, Oakley would have known the details of the case against him and most likely whether he was going to plead guilty. His “resignations” took place more or less immediately after that. What he confided to officials is obviously a matter for them.

I’m surprised that Mr Cox is not aware that Group Leaders have no power to compel delinquent councillors to stand down (particularly when they have already left the Group). For the moment Cllr. Oakley is entitled to his allowances. If he gets a custodial sentence I hope he will have the decency to do what is best for his ward constituents.

To be fair, the Conservative group leader on Watford Borough Council rang me to express shock after Oakley’s arrest, there has been absolute silence from the official party.

The chairman of Watford Conservatives described the episode as a ‘little hiccup’ in the local press and then sat beside Oakley before the court hearing, but has not contacted Watford Lib Dems to express regret at all.

Likewise we have this shrug of the shoulders from the national party, with the comment that Oakley is no longer a party member.

Although this may be both unprecedented and isolated, it is a serious issue – a sustained attempt to change the political landscape in a marginal constituency.

It is sad that the Conservatives appear to be trying so hard to avoid doing the decent thing.

He was NOT expelled – he resigned and the Leader of the Conservative group in Hillingdon called his action “Honourable”. He is currently being an extra paid £20,000 as a Cllr for the Special allowances. The Hillingdon Conservatives have done NOTHING to deal with Cllr Oakley other than belatedly call for his resignation.

A number of Hillingdon Conservatives regularly went to “Help” Cllr Oakley in Watford. God only knows in what capacity

Mike

I am not going to pre-empt the Area Conservative Party or our central organisation (let alone any ongoing Police enquiry) by calling for any specific action against the Watford Conservatives. However one of the major Hague reforms of the late ’90′s was to strengthen the Party’s powers to sack miscrent members. You will note that Oakley was expelled as the PPC, from the Conservative Group on Hillingdon and from Party membership within days, not of his conviction but his initial arrest. I anticipate that the same vigorous, inquisitorial and far-reaching methods will be used against any local officials who through complicity or neglect have brought the Conservative Party into disrepute.

Indeed, there were some ‘unfortunate’ incidents at that time. However, the response of the Regional Party was to suspend the Tower Hamlets Liberal Democrats en masse and take decisive action against those found to be guilty of inappropriate actions, a point that Paul would be fully aware of but chooses to overlook for the purposes of this defensive action.

So, Paul, you would support me in seeking a suspension of the Watford Conservative Association pending an enquiry by the Regional Party?

But, by contrast, in other cases people didn’t cotton on that they were being targetted as Lib Dems until they realised it was happening to other Lib Dems. So some incidents may have gone unreported or been reported as ordinary cases rather than political ones. I could give further details, but it would be a bit boring and convoluted.

As regards associates, I really don’t believe for a second that ‘senior local Tories’ as a body would sanction anything like this. But who knows whether he had help – to keep lookout, drive the car away etc.

There is a massive gap between suspicion and evidence. It would be fair to say that we suspected Oakley almost from the start, but finding any evidence was rather harder, and police were understandably reluctant to arrest an active politician on the basis of a hunch. It took over three years to find evidence.

If there were any accomplices there is no direct evidence against them, to the best of my knowledge. But my feeling is that it would have needed great powers of self-discipline never even to hint to a trusted associate what he was doing, and very good luck to go constantly undetected and always get away quickly for so long with no help at all.

So my personal feeling is that your last sentence may be on the right lines, but that is hunch and no more.

I understand that the list of exactly which offences Oakley has fessed up to is yet to be released. Or at least is not yet in the hands of local LibDem officials. He obviously admitted to the 75 on the advice of his legal team. Are these the 75 that the Police with time, diligence and more DNA & fingerprint tests could reasonably attribute to him? Or the ones he actually remembers doing (I suspect there might have been a lot of alcohol involved).

In the extreme circumstances like those in Watford over the last few years, there is also the problem of “over reporting”. Last month one of my political colleagues here in East London had his car keyed, coincidentally one of our local supporters had her back fence pushed (or possibly blown) down. Part of a Hate campaign? Well hardly. But if my local Party bosses were telling me to step up my personal security or I had seen my victimised associates tearful and depressed I might want those incidents logged and added to a list!

So did Ian Oakley have associates in his crimes? Well possibly, and if anyone has suspicions or evidence the best thing is to contact the Police. What I would be amazed to find is that senior local Tories would sanction, let alone participate in such a campaign. Oakley was said at the time of his selection by Open Primary to have wide support both in and outside of the Party’s ranks. Could there have been a parallel organisation loyal only to him?

Did Ian Oakley have a ‘partner in crime’? Or were there two different anti-democratic campaigns of hate against the LibDems?

My attitude is exactly the same as the Grell case: it’s good to root out the bad apples, and let the punishment be appropriately serious. I don’t know the innards of how the Tory party works (obviously), but it sounds like there needs to be damned thorough enquiry and look at the checks and balances.

The sole thing in his favour is that he has pleaded (pled?) guilty rather than denying it after conviction (unless Grell was innocent…).

Perhaps I am guilty of trying to rationalise the irrational. Certainly the sort of activities that “Sara” described, which Oakley was complaining about in the days before his Trial are hardly out of the “Black-Ops Manual”. In fact they are techniques Conservatives in Tower Hamlets regularly employ. Ian Oakley seems to have been remarkably thin skinned, which suggests the theory of mental health problems or something even more hard-wired like mild Asbergers Syndrome (lack of empathy, inflexible attitudes, obsessive behavior) might hold water.

Frankly I would think his victims would benefit by knowing WHY! even more than the rest of us. What I do agree is that this was genuine harrassment, and sustained harrassment at that from someone who wasn’t caught a day to soon.