Lord faces suspension for taking cash from firm he lobbied for
Not a backhander: in fact, Lord Shrewsbury seems to have been open in his dealings with the government and the firm for which he was lobbying. But the activity was not permitted and he should have known.
Crossbench peer Lord Shrewsbury may be suspended from the House of Lords for nine months after he was paid £57,000 after lobbying for the government to buy a firm’s products during the Covid-19 crisis.
What about the Tory peer who (allegedly) took £29 million under similar circumstances, then?
According to the BBC,
The Earl of Shrewsbury was found by the Lords Conduct Committee to have approached ministers on behalf of a company marketing Covid-19 sanitiser products, which he worked for.
The committee recommended he should be suspended for nine months, which is subject to a vote by the upper house.
He was paid £57,000 by healthcare company SpectrumX for his work as a consultant over a period of 19 months between 2020 and 2022.
In 2020, at the height of the Covid pandemic, the firm was seeking regulatory approval for products including hand sanitisers and a walk-in disinfectant tunnel.
The peer approached ministers, including then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock to promote the company’s tunnel in return for a £3,000 monthly retainer, the committee’s report found.
He referred himself to the commissioner following allegations about his conduct in relation to the company in the Sunday Times.
Dare we hope that this recommendation indicates the direction of travel for members of either House of Parliament who are found to have broken lobbying rules in such a way – with an increasingly-severe scale of penalties for those found to have broken the rules, depending on the amount of money they took and the effectiveness (or lack of the same) of the product they were touting?
That would be useful with regard to that other case, mentioned above.
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
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:
Here are four ways to be sure you’re among the first to know what’s going on.
1) Register with us by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ (in the left margin). You can then receive notifications of every new article that is posted here.
2) Follow VP on Twitter @VoxPolitical
3) Like the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/VoxPolitical/
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
4) You could even make Vox Political your homepage at http://voxpoliticalonline.com
And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
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!
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
The Livingstone Presumption is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
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:
Nothing will change. When Cameron left office he warned that ‘the next scandal will be that of lobbying’.
GOOD HE SHOULD BE
It’s almost as if every COVID contract Boris oversaw was done so that a Tory could get a bung and that the Tory party is inherently corrupt..