KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU SO! Another world exclusive commentary on the Sleazed UK House of Lords: CRASS role for Crossrail
By © Muhammad Haque
2005 Hrs GMT
London Sunday 1 February 2009
KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU SO! That the 'Crossrail Bill' 'Select Committee' in the UK House of PEERS [that allegedly ‘scrutinised’ the costs, the impact and the ‘purpose’ of the "CrossRail Bill’ during January-July 2008] behaved in a way that was blatantly dishonest…
WITH ALL THE alleged revelations in and via the London Times news organisation of the past 8 days [inclusive] and the Mail on Sunday and elsewhere [following the ‘Sunday Times’ investigation focussing on the Four members of the House of Peers last Sunday - Taylor, Truscott, Snape...] it would have been ‘reasonable’ to assume that the ‘real faults’ have been brought out by the ‘mainstream’ media in the UK and by their platformed ‘commentators’, ‘ experts’ and ‘other peers’.
That is not the case.
NOTHING has been said by a single one of those about what the House of PEERS DO get up to in their ‘ordinary’ behaviour.
That is when they are not acting as touts and tools for outside interests and parties who pay them.
The experience and the evidence of the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign against Crossrail over the past five years show that the UK Houses of Parliament are indeed not working for democracy. That in essence the key decision-making behaviour concerning the people and what the people have to say on all matters that matter is dishonest, unrepresentative opportunistic and corrupt.
The ‘House of Lords’ behaved as a stooged House in so far as the behaviour of the personnel in control of the ‘Crossrail Bill Select Committee’ in that 'House’ was concerned..
We have published, since March 2008 when the lying took place, that the personnel involved in the ‘House of Lords’ ‘CrossRail Bill Select Committee’ had LIED to distort, misrepresent and to falsify the objections to the CrossRail Bill….
We have also shown in the past 11 months that the personnel were operating systematic obstructions to objectors in order that the objections to the CrossRail Bill could not be duly included or advocated on the record.
We have also shown that the KHOODEELAAR! objections were PRECEDED by our going on the record and publishing on various external web sites INCLUDING that of London TIMES our constitutional law principle and position to the effect that the ‘CrossRail Bill’ ‘Select Committee’ in the UK ‘House of Lords’ should be allowed to deliberate on the item without interference or influence by the UK Government or by any of its ministers.
That was our pro-active contributon in the reasonable 'hope' [!!!] that the Hosue of PEERS would uphold the principles and values of democratic accountability...
Going by the account published by the London Times news organisation [see item quoted below] even members of the House of PEERRS themselves do not know what they are doing…..even as they take part in legislative activities promoting the agenda of those who pay them..
[To be continued]
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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5627971.ece
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Lords for hire
Members of the House of Lords should act primarily out of public interest. Yet some seem too ready to sell their services
Archer and Black to be ousted from Lords | Exclusive: Peers for cash investigation - new undercover footage | New secret audio recording | The scoop: how we broke the story | Insight: price for a peer to fix the law | Comment: Lords not so noble anymore | Red Box: the politics blog
Earlier this month Lord O’Neill of Clackmannan, a Labour peer, walked into the public bill office in the House of Lords with a clutch of amendments to a proposed law going through parliament. The clerks checked the amendments and agreed to their publication.
O’Neill, president of the Specialist Engineering Contractors’ Group, was trying to change a bill about the construction industry so that it would favour his organisation’s members. He is paid a fee by the group, but does not disclose how much.
Then last weekend O’Neill, a former MP, picked up The Sunday Times and was aghast. The newspaper carried extensive reports about members of the House of Lords who were apparently willing to assist in amending laws in return for payments. The reports were already making waves and O’Neill realised the amendments he had put forward could be badly misconstrued.
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“I had tabled amendments in the way I used to do when I was a backbencher,” he explained last week. “To be frank, I didn’t really think about it too much. Then I read at the weekend the exposé and thought, ‘God, I shouldn’t be doing this’.”
On Monday he hurried back to the bill office and asked for his amendments back. “I went into the Lords, saw the chief whip, spoke to the house authorities and took the necessary steps to get all the amendments removed,” he said. “I gave explicit instruction that everything in my name should go.”
One of the fundamental principles set out in the code of conduct for the House of Lords is that members “must never accept any financial inducement as an incentive or reward for exercising parliamentary influence”; another is that members “must not vote on any bill or motion, or ask any question in the house or committee, or promote any matter, in return for payment”.
Had O’Neill broken the rules? He thinks not, on the grounds that he is not “paid specifically to put down the amendments”. But like many peers he is now uncertain over the interpretation of the rules. “I felt it was a grey area and the simplest way to get out of the grey area was to withdraw the amendments,” he said.
The Sunday Times reports had thrown light on an aspect of the Lords that has gone untested for too long: the impartiality of its members. Could they be bought? Many lords recognised the danger at once.
Lord McNally, the Liberal Democrat leader in the upper house, took a call from an elderly peer who said: “It’s the first time in decades of service I am ashamed to be a member of this house”.
Baroness Royall, the Labour leader in the Lords, issued statements and hurried into print, declaring that: “If there are abuses, they must be rooted out.” As media reports of the furore spread, Lords from both main parties gathered in crisis meetings. Various peers hurried to declare interests that they had previously not included in the public register.
This weekend further evidence has emerged of practices that might highlight the ambivalent role of parliamentarians. They include Baroness Valentine, the £185,000-a-year chief executive of the business group London First, tabling amendments to a planning bill, in an attempt to make changes for which her own organisation had campaigned. She said she was acting in the best interests of London and development and had always correctly declared her interest.
Baroness Coussins, who provides corporate responsibility advice to the food and drinks industry, tried to stop and then mitigate the impact of a bill on alcohol health warnings. She said she had always declared her interests. And Lord Berkeley, who earns about £40,000 a year as chairman of the Rail Freight Group, tried to amend bills on Crossrail and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link in the interest of the freight industry. He says he was acting independently and correctly declared his interests.
Just as with revelations 15 years ago of MPs being paid to ask questions in the House of Commons, the implications are far-reaching. The result of the cash for questions scandal was the imposition of more rigorous rules and greater transparency for MPs. Politicians of all parties believe the same must now happen for peers.
Lord Campbell-Savours said: “I have seen a lot of very, very upset and angry people. It is inconceivable that the rules will remain the same after this. Too many important people are too angry for there not to be change.” Another Labour peer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “These events make the case for urgent reform of the Lords vital.” McNally said: “I am grateful for The Sunday Times jolting us out of our complacency. We have been unbelievably complacent. Urgent reform is needed - as soon as possible.”
THE Lords have long guarded their privacy. When the committee on standards in public life was set up after the cash for questions affair, it always intended to investigate the Commons first, then the Lords. Peers were none too happy at the prospect.
They preferred to investigate themselves, and gave the task to a committee headed by Lord Griffiths, a law lord. Among those who argued that the House of Lords was honourable enough to police itself and should exert its primacy was Lord Archer, the novelist who was later jailed for perjury. Others were less convinced of the probity of all members of the upper house. Lord Lester, a lawyer who had recently become a peer, gave evidence to the Griffiths committee that one of his legal clients had paid peers to amend legislation.
“I got into huge trouble,” Lester recalled last week. “I was attacked and sent to Coventry for six months. The culture at the time was one in which peers were openly being paid large sums to sponsor legislation. And no one thought there was anything wrong with it.”
Griffiths did come up with some powerful conclusions on how members should behave. In setting up new rules, he told the Lords that they should always act with honour and not accept financial rewards for parliamentary influence. “I should have thought that was self-evident,” he told the house, otherwise a member would be “perceived by the public outside as selling his voice and, worse still, selling his vote”.
For all his exhortations, the resulting code of conduct for Lords suffered from several weaknesses. First, unlike the Commons, there was no independent scrutineer. Second, sanctions were feeble: lords could still be kicked out of the house only by an act of parliament. Third, even though Lords had to register outside interests, they did not have to give full financial details - again, unlike MPs.
If members declare a “parliamentary consultancy” - being paid for advice about parliament - they have to give details. Hardly any lords declare such consultancies. Instead far more declare “nonparliamentary” consultancies, which supposedly do not relate to their work in the Lords - and for which they do not have to give details.
The system grew to be so lax that in 2007 a Labour peer, Lord Hoyle, admitted taking money from an arms company lobbyist and introducing him to the government minister in charge of weapons procurement. It caused concern, but no reform.
Other peers failed to declare their interests during proceedings in the house. In October last year Lord Taylor of Blackburn asked a question in the Lords about gas storage - without declaring that he wasa paid consultant to Canatxx, a gas storage company. Taylor apologised a week later.
The Sunday Times decided to investigate further and sent undercover reporters, posing as employees of a lobbying company, to contact Taylor offering to hire him as a parliamentary consultant. The aim was to find out whether, among other things, Taylor would be willing to change legislation.
Nine other peers who already had consultancies or were company advisers were also approached in the same way. Seven peers agreed to meet the reporters; and three Conservative lords failed to return repeated calls.
When the reporters met those peers who did accept the overtures, they explained they were working for Lou Li Jiang, a fictitious Hong Kong millionaire who was supposedly setting up a chain of retail outlets across the UK. The lords were told that Mr Lou wanted to amend the Business Rates Supplements Bill, which was going through parliament.
One of the peers, Lord Oxburgh, was genuinely bemused by the idea that he might be paid to help amend a bill he had no interest in. Over a cup of tea in the Lords, he told the reporters politely but firmly this was work he wouldn’t do.
Lord Rogan, a former president of the Ulster Unionists, was even more forthright. “If your direct proposal is as stark as for me to put an amendment down or help to put down an amendment that’s a nonrunner: a, it’s not right and b, my personal integrity wouldn’t let me do it,” he said.
However, a number of Labour peers were willing to give assistance. They were Lord Taylor; Lord Truscott, a former energy minister; Lord Snape, a former government whip; and Lord Moonie, a former defence minister. Last week all four made it clear during their discussions with The Sunday Times that they did not think they had broken the rules.
So what did they agree to do? Taylor, a blunt 79-year-old, told the reporter that amending legislation for paid clients was the sort of work he had done before. He claimed that he had changed legislation for Experian, the credit check company. When the reporter asked him what his fee structure would be, he replied: “Some companies that I work for will pay me £100,000 a year . . . That’s cheap for what I do for them.”
Over lunch with two undercover reporters in mid-January, Taylor said he would work to amend the rates bill and talk to ministers to make the case on behalf of the Far East client. He agreed a fee of £10,000 a month. Truscott was initially careful when he met the reporters for afternoon tea in the peers’ dinning room. Though he said he was willing to help the reporters for his normal fee of £2,000 a day, he said that he would draw the line at lobbying. By the end of the meeting, however, he was offering to contact other peers, officials and ministers.
Realising the the campaign to amend the rate bill might take more work than he had originally thought, he e-mailed the reporters offering to do three days’ consultancy a month, at a rate equating to a fee of £72,000 over the year.
Moonie made it clear that he could only operate within the rules as he saw them. But he said he would be able to identify members of parliament to whom the reporters could make their pitch and help find members who would put down the amendment for them.
Snape at first said he wouldn’t be able to work on amending the bill if he was being paid directly by the Far Eastern client. However, he said he thought he could do it if the lobbying company was paying his fees, which amounted to £24,000 a year. “The obvious question that the registrar would ask me would be, ‘Who’s paying you?’ So it has to be either yourself, again it doesn’t particularly matter to me, provided I could do it on a blanket basis.”
He believed that if he was paid by the lobbying company and not directly by the client, that made a difference. He also drew a distinction between presenting a general case that might benefit all new businesses and an amendment aimed at a specific client. TO many people it might seem self-evident that being willing to accept money from people seeking to amend the law was dubious at best. If an amendment had general merit, why should they be paid at all? The four Labour peers, however, denied any wrongdoing when the The Sunday Times confronted them with what they had said. Taylor, who had left messages on one of the reporters’ phones saying that he was already meeting ministers, denied that he had taken any action.
Taylor: They [the reporters] just asked me about what is happening and so on and I gave them my advice but I am not contracted with them in any way.
Reporter: Oh, I understood you had agreed to a consultancy fee of £10,000 per month.
Taylor: Oh no.
Reporter: And that you had already started doing work for them.
Taylor: Oh no.
He then claimed he had known from the beginning that he was dealing with undercover reporters. “I was playing them along,” he said. One of his real consultancy clients, Experian, does not appear to have been impressed. It severed links with him last week.
Truscott said: “What I could do was obviously follow the legislation as it goes through the house and keep them informed, but I specifically said that I would not put forward the amendments myself and they would have to identify people to whom they should make their case.” Landis+Gyr, the Swiss-based “smart meter” company that employs Truscott as a consultant, ended his contract last week.
Moonie admitted that he had offered to contact the relevant minister, but explained: “I made it clear to them while I could write to John [Healey, the local government minister in charge of the rates bill] on their behalf, obviously not using House of Lords paper . . . I didn’t say that I would use House of Lords paper.”
Moonie said he had “agreed to seek to help to find a way of trying to amend the legislation” and added that “to assist somebody in finding a way of getting an amendment put down, yes of course it is within the rules”.
Snape argued that he had acted properly because, although he might be paid, he would have been acting for the good of new businesses generally. He said: “I said I was quite prepared to discuss with them how legislation could be changed which would benefit businesses throughout the UK. And if they wanted to take me on as a consultant for their company my usual fees were . . . which I went through.”
His lawyers sent a letter to this newspaper saying that the allegation that he had offered to amend legislation for a fee was utterly false and without foundation.
NEWS of The Sunday Times investigation spread fast once the peers had been confronted. At Westminster, Royall was in her office, complete with ornate ceiling and oil paintings, when she learnt what had happened.
At first she thought one peer was involved, and the affair seemed containable. When it became clear at least four were involved, Royall knew the matter could not be dismissed. Liaising with Downing Street, she summoned staff, prepared statements and ordered an inquiry. In Westminster and beyond peers spluttered with indignation and dismay as they read the revelations.
Among some of the hereditary peers who had been excluded from the House of Lords under reforms by Tony Blair in 1999 there was a hint of schadenfreude. True aristocrats were above such grubby dealings, they thought.
Lord Gainford, a Tory hereditary peer whose grandfather served in government, said: “I never heard of anything like this – taking money to change laws. I just can’t imagine anyone doing it.” Lord Stanley of Alderley, another hereditary peer, said: “In my days I did a lot of work for the farming industry, and all I ever got from them was a dinner.” Earl Lytton, a descendant of the poet Lord Byron, said: “At the moment, the Lords is looked upon as if it were the spoils of war – it’s for them [the Lords] and it’s for their own enrichment.”
Further investigations have now unearthed more details about Taylor and Truscott’s previous dealings apparently relating to consultancy clients. In 1997, Taylor was appointed a director of Canatxx, which was engaged in a joint venture with General Electric (GE) to build a gas-fired power station in his constituency.
Company accounts reveal that Canatxx Energy Ventures paid Taylor £43,264 in 1997 and £45,567 in 1999 through a consultancy run by Janet Robinson, who is now his assistant in the Lords. The consultancy was declared in the House of Lords’ register of members’ interests.
In his meetings with the undercover reporters, Taylor boasted of his contact with Gary Mohammed, a civil servant who gives the secretary of state recommendations on whether large gas power stations should be built. Taylor claimed Mohammed could tell him whether a power station was likely to be approved before a planning application was submitted.
He said: “There’s a little chappie called Gerry [sic] Mohammed, who works in Victoria Street and does all the recommendations to ministers and civil servants. He is only a very low-grade man but he knows more about energy than anyone else.” Mohammed, who is based at the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, last week denied giving Taylor advance notice of whether planning applications were likely to be allowed, but said he had been lobbied by him.
In 2001 Taylor also took Mohammed for lunch in the House of Lords. Mohammed said: “We ate in the fancy bit [of the House of Lords]. As I had never been in the Lords’ restaurant I thought to myself, ‘I’ll have a pie and a pint there’. I suppose it’s like any restaurant. You pay too much for too little.”
Taylor is now a paid consultant with NPL Estates, a regeneration company which in August 2008 announced plans to build a £600m gas-powered turbine at Fleetwood with Welsh Power. NPL said he was not involved in lobbying or advisory work for the proposed power station. Canatxx said Taylor had not been paid to lobby but to give them advice and “strategic counsel”. Mohammed insisted he was impartial and speaks to “all sides” before making any recommendations.
On Friday Taylor admitted lobbying Mohammed, but said his interests had been declared in person and on the register. His lawyer added: “Lord Taylor has committed no criminal offence and has broken no rule of the House of Lords.”
Inquiries last week also revealed that in February 2008 Truscott sat down for lunch with Malcolm Wicks, then energy minister. Their conversation ranged widely about Britain’s energy interests. Wicks said last week: “We had lunch and chatted about all sorts of things, mainly as I recall about Russia, which Peter [Truscott] has a strong interest in. We talked about energy policy.
“One of the big issues for us is that we’ve got declining stocks from the North Sea and we’re having to import more [gas]. We talked about where we’re going to get our gas in Europe and Russia crops up, of course it does.”
Truscott is an expert on Russia. He has a Russian wife, Svetlana, and has written three books on the country. He also told our undercover reporters t h a t h e w a s t a l k i n g t o Gazprom, the state-controlled Russian gas giant, about issues of interest to it and their growing presence in the UK gas market.
Sources close to Wicks said he was “incredulous” that Truscott had decided to help Gazprom. “He is amazed that he’s involved with them commercially,” the source said. “Gazprom is no ordinary gas company, it’s crucial to the Russian economy and everyone knows how close it is to Putin and the state.”
When Truscott met the reporters, he was fresh from lunch with someone from Gazprom, and was keen to reveal more. “I’ve just had lunch with someone from Gazprom,” he said. “One of the companies I advise, advises Gazprom. I don’t advise Gazprom directly. I’d get into Private Eye with even an indirect connection.”
Truscott is paid as a consultant by Gavin Anderson, a PR firm that represents Gazprom’s gas exporting arm and UK subsidiary. He went on to tell reporters how he provides advice to the company’s rapidly expanding UK retail arm, which supplies gas to 10,000 business outlets including Chelsea and Manchester United. Truscott said that he recently had dinner with a group of Gazprom delegates, and had given them a guided tour of parliament. “I showed them around the Commons and Lords and after dinner they wanted to [go to] the chamber,” he said. “They quite enjoyed that.”
It is not clear whether this breached any parliamentary rules and yesterday Truscott could not be reached for comment. His paid role as an adviser to Gavin Anderson is registered with the House of Lords. Wicks said Truscott had not lobbied him or influenced his energy policy in any way.
A spokesman for Gavin Anderson, which has suspended Truscott’s consultancy pending the outcome of any investigations, said: “He is employed to give us general advice on parliamentary matters and what was being discussed in the House of Lords. He wasn’t advising Gazprom on anything specific. He has never formally met any of the UK executives. We believe he has met them informally at industry events.”
Gazprom Marketing & Trading, the UK subsidiary of Gazprom, said Truscott had never acted as an adviser. A spokesman said: “We don’t have any political interference in our activities at all.”
This week, a House of Lords subcommittee on peers’ interests, chaired by the crossbencher Baroness Prashar, will scrutinise more than 100 pages of documents relating to the Sunday Times investigation. Other members of the committee include Lord Irvine, the former lord chancellor, and Baroness Manningham-Buller, the former head of MI5.
The first question for the subcommittee will be: did the four peers approached by undercover reporters break the current rules? But the inquiry opens up a wider question that the subcommittee and the all peers must now finally confront: are the present rules sufficient to uphold the integrity of parliament?
Lord Brabazon of Tara, chairman of the Lords privileges committee, has already been asked by Royall to investigate the code, which has been exposed as lax, ambiguous and open to misinterpretation. The public no longer believes that the noble lords can always be trusted to act on their honour.
The Erminegate cast
Lord Truscott, 49 A Russian expert and a former MEP. Softly spoken and erudite. Works extensively for the private sector, specialising in energy.
Lord Snape, 66 Former West Midlands MP with an acerbic wit. A former railwayman who has since picked up transport work in the private sector. Consultant to FirstGroup, the bus and rail company.
Lord Taylor of Blackburn, 79 Former Blackburn councillor and education adviser to Margaret Thatcher who combines extensive contacts book with business bonhomie. Clients include Canatxx, an energy company. Ennobled in 1978.
Lord Moonie, 61 Former Labour defence minister and one of 16 MPs given peerages by Blair in 2005. Has a nonexecutive directorship with PartyGaming, an online poker house, as well as other business interests.
Lord O’Neill, 64 As a Labour MP, he was chairman of trade and industry select committee. A firm advocate for the business sector. Made a peer in 2005.
Baroness Royall, 53, leader of the Lords Former Labour special adviser and European Union bureaucrat. Only been in her current role since October, but has been calm amid the furore.
Baroness Valentine of Putney, 50 A crossbencher, she combines being in the Lords with a high-powered job as chief executive of the business group London First. A formidable voice for business.
Baroness Coussins, 58 Made a crossbencher in 2007. Runs her own food and drink consultancy, advising on corporate responsibility.
Have your say
Why should anyone be surprised? Should have been abolished years ago.
Margaret Harrison, Port hope Ontario, Canada
There should be a clear distinction between corrupt and honourable behaviour by Peers and MPs. I see nothing wrong in them having other jobs or interests provided they are not acting corruptly. There is much to be said for them having outside interests. (I am a UK taxpayer but have no vote in UK)
Douglas Holder, Altea,
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