23 Comments

• ColinW 7th Jun '08 - 1:41am

  Same old Tories…snouts in the trough.

• Anonymous 7th Jun '08 - 8:30am

  And let’s not forget Derek Conway, James Gray, Nigel Waterson, Andrew Pelling… Who else? I can see a theme here.

  Could it be used somehow like this: “Don’t vote for ideologically and financially bankrupt Labour, nor for corrupted and criminal Tories”? Maybe LDV could have a competition in order to find something more rhyming.

• Paul Griffiths 7th Jun '08 - 8:37am

  Actually, these stories make me nervous. Let he who is without sin and so on.

• Anonymous 7th Jun '08 - 8:58am

  OK, just hand the stone to me, if your hands are in dirt… 😉

• Peter 7th Jun '08 - 11:53am

  Persoanlly I enjoy the weak excuses. The Spelman story that the Nanny worked for board and lodging in her childcare role and for cash as a secretary is classic. Everyone else seems to go for the “extreme stupidity” excuse: they cannot be expected to understand the rules.

• Russ 7th Jun '08 - 12:29pm

  The BBC quotes the nanny saying she remembers answering the phone to take some messages from time to time, and posting some letters. I’m not a fan of Guido’s, but he’s right – MPs engaged in this sort of deception are stealing from the public. If I nicked thousands of pounds out of an MP’s purse I’d be prosecuted, so why aresn’t MPs prosecuted when they steal thousands of pounds out of mine?

• Laurence Boyce 7th Jun '08 - 1:46pm

  Before you all rush to condemn Caroline, please bear in mind that she is a trustee of the Conservative Christian Fellowship, so I’m sure she can’t have done anything wrong.

• Mund 7th Jun '08 - 2:02pm

  Hehe

• Russ 7th Jun '08 - 6:31pm

  Sorry Laurence, I don’t understand your point. She’s an MP and she’s used tax-payers’ cash to pay her nanny. And she’s rightly facing questions over her future. What does her work with the Conservative Christian Fellowship have to do with it?

• Anonymous 7th Jun '08 - 6:36pm

  Russ, I guess you don’t understand irony?

• Stuart 7th Jun '08 - 6:50pm

  I’ve now watched her statement to the press from the gate of her large country house. This brings the mid-90s all back to me. What fun!

• Not again 7th Jun '08 - 7:29pm

  What is the difference in paying a nanny and claiming childcare expenses?

• Russ 7th Jun '08 - 7:38pm

  I’m fine with the irony. Let us assume that Laurence is suggesting Caroline’s involvement with the Conservative Christian Fellowship makes her wrongdoing somehow more heinous (or at least interesting) than if she wasn’t involved. My question is, why would that be the case? My own feeling is that it undermines a rock-solid case against corruption in Parliament if we get distracted by irrelevant innuendoes or existing prejudices.

  If Laurence, or anyone else, wants to argue the relevance of Caroline’s work with the CCF, I’d invite them to do so.

• bishop Hill 7th Jun '08 - 7:58pm

  I do wonder if Labour and LibDems need to be a bit cautious here. The Open Europe survey which started off this run of scandals found Labour and LibDem MEPs even more reluctant to disclose their expenses than Conservatives.

• Laurence Boyce 7th Jun '08 - 7:58pm

  Let us assume that Laurence is suggesting Caroline’s involvement with the Conservative Christian Fellowship makes her wrongdoing somehow more heinous (or at least interesting) than if she wasn’t involved.

  Well if I was doing that, it would be a fairly standard case of pointing out religious hypocrisy. But in fact what I really think is that being a Conservative Christian is a far greater crime than any mere financial scandal! 😉 Especially this one which is looking like small beer . . .

• Russ 7th Jun '08 - 8:16pm

  Mmmm, the nanny’s statement in the last couple of hours does seem to have let Caroline off the hook. So I guess all bets and related debates are off, at least until the next bit of account-fiddling comes to light. These politicians never let us down, I’m sure it won’t be more than a week or so…

• Rod 7th Jun '08 - 8:17pm

  Have you read the latest on BBC website.

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7442053.stm

• Russ 7th Jun '08 - 8:23pm

  Off the hook with the media, I should stress, who drive these things forward. Not actually innocent of wrongdoing.

• davy 7th Jun '08 - 10:07pm

  ICM S.TELEGRAPH Con 42 Lab 26 LibDem 21 lead up 2 points to 16

  LOL! Nuffsaid

• Stuart 7th Jun '08 - 11:39pm

  @bishop Hill: I would suggest that any politician of whichever colour who has been fiddling their expenses and in effect stealing taxpayers’ money (aka my money) deserves everything they get. The fact that they wear a yellow rosette at election time would not make me any more forgiving.

• Stuart 9th Jun '08 - 9:41am

  From today’s edition of the Sun, “MEP Sajjad Karim also faces questions after paying his wife Zahida £26,000 a year of taxpayers’ cash.”

  I am sure the Conservatives are very pleased to have him on board.

• Sesenco 9th Jun '08 - 10:33am

  “ICM S.TELEGRAPH Con 42 Lab 26 LibDem 21 lead up 2 points to 16”

  Tory share still lower than it was in 1979, 1983 and 1987, and about par with 1992. The Tories need to be doing far better than this two years away from a General Election.

• Stuart 9th Jun '08 - 12:53pm

  @Sesenco: that’s only because our (LD) share is so high.