Geoff Hoon…

..on Breakfast just now said that Labour maintain the highest standards in terms of donations. All together “Yeah, right!”

Labour Donations Scandal

The headlines for Labour and Gordon Brown could hardly be worse today, the Labour funding scandal that has engulfed the government is likely to do immense damage. The facts are widely known, a rich man has given large amounts of money through third parties to the Labour party in contravention of the funding laws.

Firstly Mr Abrahams claims that he did this to maintain his anonymity. Some are suggesting that this is ridiculous as years ago he wanted to stand for Parliament. I tend to take this on face value as a man who had his fingers burnt may decide to retreat from public life. All I will say is that if he wanted to remain anonymous, his tactic has failed.

Secondly it appears that the arrangements that Mr Abrahams had put in place for his donating were known by parts of the Labour Party but unknown by other parts. This to me is the weird part, the list of people who appears to have know is sporadic and as yet their is know common link. However what seems strange is the Deputy leadership aspect, Benn was wary and told by Baroness Jay regarding Mr Abrahams proxy donation. Harman took the cash, why was Harman’s team not told? Is the Labour Party that dysfunctional that this kind of information is kept secret.

Then their is the reaction of the Labour leader, who has set up enquiries to look into this. This to me is a complete diversion, the law has been broken, the enquiry is a fig leaf it covers up Brown’s acute embarrassment. The problem is clearly the Labour fundraising culture which believes that the rules somehow apply to everyone except them. I have no doubt that within a week or so their will be a massive clamour for huge state funding of political parties. I have no doubt that some level of state funding may be necessary, as we need to have fully functional political parties. What we need is a donations cap for all donors, a spending cap and limited state funding of parties potentially part-funded through the removal of the ridiculous communications allowance for MP’s.

Cash for Honours

So the Attorney is getting involved in this at the request of the Police. Well all I will say on this is that it is a very intriguing development, and shows the difficult balance that must be struck between public interest journalism and ensuring that any potential trial is not prejudiced. I will say no more, there will be plenty to say in the future if charges are brought or not.