Is it a requirement that ‘work and pensions’ MPs falsify their CVs?
Owen Smith. Oh dear…
Remember Iain Duncan Smith?
It may seem like forever since he resigned as Work and Pensions secretary but in fact it was only March. I mention him because Michael Crick reported in 2002 that aspects of his curriculum vitae were demonstrably false.
As This Blog put it:
“It seems he didn’t go to the Universita di Perugia in Italy, founded by the Pope in 1308, but to the Universita per Stranieri (University for Foreigners) which was founded in 1921 and did not grant degrees when he studied there in 1973. IDS did not get any qualifications there or even finish his exams.
“He wasn’t educated at Dunchurch College of Management either. This was the former staff college for GEC Marconi, for whom he worked in the 1980s. IDS completed six separate courses lasting a few days each, adding up to about a month in total. He quite clearly was not there for a sustained period of time and never earned a recognised qualification there.”
Now it seems Owen Smith has been caught lying on his CV as well.
It’s fun to speculate that perhaps working on the Work and Pensions brief in Parliament encourages these MPs to falsify their life stories – perhaps in an effort to encourage jobseekers to do the same? But in this case we must also ask a far harder question:
Do we really want a(nother) liar for a Labour Party leader?
After The Guardian reported that Owen Smith was never a board member of one of the world’s biggest biotech companies, Amgen, the Labour leadership hopeful scrambled to change an item on his CV which had stated the opposite:
“a director and member of the UK and Ireland board of Amgen”
Smith did indeed work at Amgen, but as the American firm itself told The Guardian:
“Owen Smith’s position at Amgen did not give him any involvement or influence on the topics raised here – he was an employee in the UK for 18 months and was not an officer of the company or board member.”
Smith’s team responded by insisting that ‘board member’ did accurately reflect his work at the US giant:
“[Smith] was on the most senior director level in the UK, but they are only allowed to have one – in company terms – board and that is the USA, but it is a shorthand for what he did there.”
But within a few hours of the revelation being made public, Smith had changed the item on his website:
“a director and member of the UK and Ireland team of Amgen.”
Source: Labour candidate Owen Smith scrambles to change his CV after an embarrassing revelation | The Canary
ADVERT
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
my daughter mike works alongside mp’s/lords in a consultancy role as she will tell you there far from bright
the only thing some are good at and that’s talking ‘but even then she detects they don’t know there subject
a good speaker is persuasive but is no much for some of the younger talent from the universities of today
The only thing worse than a liar is a liar that’s also a hypocrite! Tennessee Williams
Strange, I was always told (back in the past when honesty counted), that if you lied on your CV and your employer discovered you lied to them you should expect to be instantly dismissed and out the door!
As ‘we the people’ are his employers I think we should have every right to tell him to “Go and Go Now”!
Owen Smith’s CV up until about 23rd July listed him as having been a “Director and member of the UK and Ireland Board of Amgen”. That claim was false. His CV has now been changed to say he was a “Director and member of the UK and Ireland Team of Amgen”. That is not a small matter in business terms – having been a member of a Board of Directors means a great deal in commerce.
The excuse proffered by Smith’s spokesperson is that “[Smith] was on the most senior director level in the UK, but they are only allowed to have one – in company terms – board and that is the USA, but it is a shorthand for what he did there”. I was intrigued by this, and I went to look at Amgen in the UK and Ireland’s website. The website shows that Amgen in the UK and Ireland consists of Amgen Limited and Amgen Ireland Limited. I went to Amgen Limited’s Companies House information (company number 02354269, nature of business 72110 – Research and experimental development on biotechnology) and looked at their People. The list shows 4 current Officers and 29 Resignations, none of which bear the name Owen Smith. So of what was he a Director exactly?
Amgen has stated that “Owen Smith’s position at Amgen did not give him any involvement or influence on the topics raised here – he was an employee in the UK for 18 months and was not an officer of the company or board member.”
“Not an officer of the company” means, specifically, that Smith was not a Director or Company Secretary (if UK law applies). I am not quite sure if US or Irish law permits someone to bear the title Director without being an officer of the company. However, it would be good to know what Smith was a Director of, if in fact he was one at all.
http://uk.businessinsider.com/labour-mp-owen-smith-changes-cv-after-questions-from-media-2016-7
http://www.amgen.co.uk/about/amgen-in-the-uk-and-ireland/
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/02354269/officers
He should be shown the door