Tag Archives: jonathan aitkin

Mary Reid

After prison

By Mary Reid | Tue 12th March 2013 - 1:30 pm

jonathanaitkenA former journalist, who rose through the political ranks to become a cabinet minister, resigns in the midst of a scandal of his own making, strenuously denies the allegations but is convicted of perverting the course of justice and goes to prison, with his political career and reputation destroyed.

That was the tragedy of  Jonathan Aitken, who has been doing the media rounds in the last 24 hours.

I want to tell his story – it happened some years ago so some readers may not remember – because it is a tale of redemption.

The incident that led to his downfall took place in when he was Minister of State for Defence Procurement, but it only came to light in 1995 after he had been promoted to Chief Secretary to the Treasury. He accepted hospitality, in the form of nights at the Ritz in Paris, from a Saudi businessman.   The Guardian unearthed the story and Granada investigated it further in World in Action documentary.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged and | 8 Comments
Advert

Recent Comments

  • David Warren
    The first step has to be to take the profit motive out of the system. As a family carer for several years I witnessed companies trying to squeeze every last ...
  • Rif Winfield
    First let me say that I've been campaigning for STV elections for over half a century (February 1974 is when I initiated the Liberal Action Group for Electoral ...
  • Jason Connor
    Try and listen to Sharon Graham's speech, the Unite General Secretary at their conference. Now that's what I call a radical progressive speech, not Andy Burnham...
  • Jana
    @Peter Davies “ Many now pay off their mortgage, inherit their parents’ house and get a private pension at about the same time. All those things are prefer...
  • Peter Davies
    "Has anyone mentioned UBI?" surprisingly not yet on this article. Both Mick who points out that the pension is not high and those who point out the massive weal...