Liberal Vision

FEDERAL EXECUTIVE MEET

The Lib Dem Federal Executive met last night. The contents of the meeting will (if they have any sense) be made public in double quick time.

This will be a big test for the group AND for its chair Ros Scott. Will this have been (1) a useless talking shop about do-nothing-unimportant side issues – or will they have (2) tackled the serious and important issues facing this party regarding expenses & allowances ?

I am of course, expecting clarification on what is happening with regard to the Lord Rennard, who was/is the Party’s Chief Executive – employed by the Federal Executive  and who recently resigned claiming ill health. Co-incidentally he also still has serious fraud accusations  (relating to allowance claims) hanging over him that, until now, the FE has been unwilling to deal with.

It now seems generally accepted that he is in fact away running the Lib Dem Norwich North by election campaign. IF TRUE, then how can we face the electorate with any seriousness at this or any other election? If we are willing to continue to employ somebody who has such serious question marks over them – that we leave unaddressed – we will face the consequenses sooner or later.   If it is NOT TRUE , well it just highlights how important it is for the FE to get a grip on this.

Investigate him and either clear his name, or take sanctions against him as an employee of the Party. Surely this is the ONLY option available to the FE ? And should have been item 1 on last nights agenda (if not the previous meeting).

The clock is ticking as we wait for the report from the Party President. And if it turns out that they have ducked this issue again, the clock might just start ticking on the FE itself and perhaps more importantly, its chair.

Or maybe, they will surprise us.

Lord Rennard reported to the Privileges Committee

I hear that Lord Rennard has been referred to the Privileges Committee over his expenses claims – particularly, but not uniquely, his claim that his primary residence is in Eastbourne.  He has been reported by the Sunlight Centre for Open Politics.

Those with long memories will remember the resolution of the Federal Executive Committee meeting, over a month ago, on 20th May 2009. This promised, amongst other things, a code of conduct to be published by mid-June. If it has been published, I can’t find any sign of it on the official party website (although as I can’t find a way of actually searching the party website, it’s hard to be sure).

Click here for the letter calling for an investigation

More to follow.

Sort out the party and do it now

Just when we were all getting fatigued with stories of the Commoners raiding the cash box, The Sunday Times brings us fresh tales of skulduggery in “the other place”. One Labour peer and one Lib Dem peer are accused of some serious fiddling of allowances.

Lord Clarke of Hampstead makes some sort of a fist of it. A true Labour peer, (starting out life as a postman before climbing the trade union pole to the top) Lord Clarke does a full mea culpa in the paper. His admissions are simply toe-curling. He admits to regularly falsely claiming overnight allowances, pocketing around £18000 a year and, more shockingly, that he was told to do it “as a way of getting remuneration in the absense of salary”. Worringly he ranked as the lowly 169th highest claimant for overnight expenses across 2007-2008. The cat, as they say, is well and truly amongst the pigeons.

The Lib Dem peer Lord Dykes of Harrow Weald is an altogether a different matter. The paper states that Lord Dykes has claimed £66,000 since 2004 by claiming his main home is in Normandy – despite one Normandy neighbour stating that “they are here only one or two weekends a month. It is a second home”. Lord Dykes response to the paper thus far has been only to say that his main home is in France.

Maybe his neighbours are mistaken. Maybe he does live in France and can, as Agent Orange identifies, easily explain how he clocked in 139 days in the House of Lords in the year 2007-2008, and maybe he was too busy (or in France?) to clarify his position with the Sunday Times more fully.

But the question must now be, who within the party is advising Lord Rennard and Lord Dykes to stay quiet? And if they are not being advised by the Party to  stay quiet, if indeed, they are defying the party by their refusal to explain themselves, then why is no action being taken? This is doing the party harm.

I am not sure why it took 4 days for the Federal Executive to issue a lamentable 5 point plan on expenses that I could have written in ten minutes. I am also not sure why we as a party are so forthright on our suggestions for reform of the  system, and so backward at putting our own party in order.

But action must surely be taken now by the party, or it will be the party itself that will have to face reform.

Lord Rennard and the future of the Lib Dems

Diabetes and “family time” aside, according to Agent Orange, Lord Rennard is still out and about doing his bit for the cause. Whether this is wise with allegations over his allowances claims still unanswered is another matter.