Tag Archives: second

MP extra jobs: Led By Donkeys’ investigation rushes to unexpected conclusion

Hancock shock: he was the only MP interviewed by Led By Donkeys’ fake firm who actually pointed out that he had a responsibility to his constituents.

This took me a little by surprise. The last three Led By Donkeys video films about MPs trying to get an extra job with a fake foreign firm, ignoring the plight of their poverty-stricken constituents, have been released over the last 24 hours.

Here they are. Firstly, Tory Wimbledon MP Stephen Hammond, who already has two extra jobs that make as much money for him as his Parliamentary salary. The (relatively recent) saying is true: money isn’t earned any more – it is a commodity that may be demanded in greater or lesser amounts according to circumstances…

Here’s the clip:

It’s fascinating how he talks about his price range being at the lower end of the scale suggested – then he readily agrees to suggest remuneration at the middle-to-top end of the scale.

Next up: Sir Gavin Williamson, who left his last Tory government job under a cloud of bullying accusations:

Interestingly, he at least took a more sceptical attitude toward the fake company, seeking to establish that it was bona fide. But he still joined a Zoom call to discuss the fake job being offered to him.

And when he found out the firm wanted to meet government ministers, he made his excuses and hung up. It seems he did not want to be involved with an organisation that may seek to influence government policy.

It provides a curious footnote to Williamson’s career. After years on the wrong side of the headlines, he suddenly did the right thing.

That being said, and as with all the other Tories, the well-being of his constituents still took second place to his own comfort as he has since taken a second job with an education firm, for which he takes £50,000 per year.

Finally: Matt Hancock – described by Led By Donkey’s as an independent MP, having lost the Tory whip due to his appearance on TV’s I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, and by a commenter on the video clip as the kind of person you have to admire: “Imagine waking up as Matt Hancock every morning and not simply throwing yourself into the ocean.”

He was interviewed in the week his damning WhatsApp conversations about the Covid-19 crisis were publicised in the press, and announced he would be standing down as an MP at the next election.

He still seemed to have time to discuss a second job with a foreign firm – although, let’s be fair: he was the only MP in the Led By Donkeys investigation who mentioned any responsibility to his constituents at all.

And, again, he stressed he’d stick to Parliamentary rules about meetings with government ministers.

Surprisingly, Led By Donkeys did not sum up their findings at all.

Well, I have a few – and here they are:

Firstly, it is clear that all five of the MPs who interviewed for the fake job were quite happy to have such a position alongside their work as MPs and for their constituents; they all wanted to get on the gravy train.

Four of them had no concerns about security – doesn’t that make them security risks?

Three of them did not have apparent concerns about being used as conduits for a firm to talk to ministers. Another one, who said he could not lobby directly, said there was a way around the rules. Only one refused to have anything to do with behaviour that might be used to attempt to influence government policy. So it seems the majority were happy to help influence the government by these means.

And only one MP – possibly the one who might be least expected to do so – actually mentioned a duty to constituents.

So the intention of the investigation is proved: it seems clear that, among some MPs at least, the well-being of UK citizens comes a distant second to the opportunity to use status as an MP to rake in pots of cash.

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MPs’ extra jobs: Tory backbench chairman Sir Graham Brady interviews for SIXTH job

The latest Led By Donkeys video clip on MPs taking extra jobs is now available – and focuses on Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the Tories’ backbench 1922 committee.

He’s a highly important Parliamentary figure being the MP who takes ‘no confidence’ votes in Tory Party leaders and announces the result in the leadership elections that may follow.

He also has four other jobs already. How much opportunity does that provide for commercial concerns to influence him, and for him to influence Parliament in turn?

Here, he participates in a job interview for the fake South Korean firm set up by the campaigning group:

He never mentioned his obligations to his constituents.

It is possible that this is because – as he stated to Led By Donkeys when the group contacted him – he is planning to quit Parliament at the next election, and he took part in the interview because he is looking for new opportunities beyond his life as an MP.

Looking at what he said in the interview, do you think that’s true?

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While we face financial hardship, Tory MPs demand a fortune to work for a fake firm

Matt Hancock: of course the MP who took a six-figure sum to appear on I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here was interested.

Remember Led By Donkeys – the campaign group that came to public knowledge by putting posters on billboards showing politicians’ hypocrisy about Brexit?

Well, as people in the UK face continued financial hardship, and at a time when MPs may reasonably be expected to be concentrating on their main job, this group wanted to see how many may be tempted to take a second job, promoting a foreign firm (that doesn’t exist), to boost their own fortunes.

The operation netted interest from some big names, as you can see from this trailer:

I’m willing to bet you can’t wait for the next episode.

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Lee Anderson’s second job hypocrisy

Lee Anderson: he’s the one on the right, pictured with another controversial man at the moment, Boris Johnson. Strangely enough, ’30p Lee’ has not, to This Writer’s knowledge, criticised Johnson for the many other paying engagements he takes on and it seems unlikely he ever will, now that he has also taken a second job.

Tory MP ’30p Lee’ Anderson, who once said MPs should not take second jobs but should quit Parliament altogether before seeking a higher-paying career… is taking a second job.

He’ll be drawing down £100,000 a year on a GB News TV show:

The hypocrisy is clear. I don’t have video clips of Anderson saying the words quoted above, but here’s one of him saying MPs who can’t live on their £84,000-a-year salary should get a job as a lorry driver instead:

The funny side is, Anderson wouldn’t even do that.

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Government’s role in death of benefit claimant to be examined in new inquest

Jodey Whiting: death by DWP?

The role of the Department for Work and Pensions in the death of former Employment and Support Allowance claimant Jodey Whiting is to be examined after the Court of Appeal approved a second inquest.

The decision follows representations by solicitors Leigh Day, and I’ll let them explain:

Jodey’s mother, Joy Dove, has been fighting for five years to have a second inquest into Jodey’s death to examine the role of the DWP.

The Court ruled that it is desirable in the interests of justice for a new inquest to be held to investigate how Jodey came by her death in light of new evidence Joy obtained after the first inquest into Jodey’s death.

The Court found that it was not only desirable for Joy and her family to have an inquest into Jodey’s death at which they could invite a Coroner to make findings about the role of the DWP’s failings in Jodey’s death, but also that the public at large has a “legitimate interest” in this investigation being carried out.

On the specific facts of the case, the Court of Appeal rejected the argument that the DWP owed Jodey a legal obligation to protect her life (within the meaning of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights) under the Human Rights Act.

Jodey took her own life aged 42 on February 21, 2017. She had multiple physical and mental illnesses which left her housebound and entirely reliant on welfare benefits. She died a fortnight after her benefits were terminated because she did not attend a Work Capability Assessment. At the time of the assessment, Jodey was housebound with pneumonia, had been in hospital, and had found out that she had a cyst on the brain.

Since Jodey’s death, her mother, Joy Dove, has fought tirelessly for a second inquest into her death so that the role of the DWP can be examined. The first inquest into Jodey’s death lasted only 37 minutes and the coroner refused to consider the role of the DWP.

In the years since the first inquest, new evidence has come to light, including an investigation into the handling of Jodey’s benefits by the DWP and a report from an independent consultant psychiatrist, who concluded that it is likely Jodey’s mental state would have been substantially affected by the DWP’s failings.

The Court of Appeal judgment notes that it is accepted by the DWP that its failings in Jodey’s case “were extensive, both before and after it stopped her benefits with effect from 7 February 2017.” It went on to explain that the Court’s ruling that the DWP did not owe Jodey a legal obligation under Article 2 is “not to ignore the multiple failings on the part of the Department. The Department accepts that individuals within the Department failed to follow the relevant systems and policies at crucial points.”

The judgment explains that the new evidence which was crucial to the decision to order a new inquest was Dr Turner’s evidence that “Jodey would have experienced shock and distress at the withdrawal of her welfare benefits and that the effect would have been heightened by her current difficulties, her isolation and her pain”. It explains that a new inquest is desirable because it is appropriate for a coroner consider, based on Dr Turner’s evidence, whether it is appropriate to record “any link or connection between the withdrawal of the welfare benefits and her mental state in the period leading up to Jodey’s death”.

It is hoped that a date for the new inquest will be set soon and that the DWP will be made an Interested Person in the inquest. The family hope that the inquest will consider the failings of the DWP, as identified by the independent investigation, and the effects of these failings on Jodey’s mental state, including whether or not the failings more than minimally contributed to Jodey’s death.

Joy Dove said:

“I am so pleased and grateful to the Court of Appeal and I would like to thank the Court of Appeal judges that considered Jodey’s case. We buried Jodey just over six years ago and finally my family and I have the chance of getting justice for Jodey.

“Jodey is never going to be forgotten and her death was not in vain, she’s helping others and her legacy will live on. We have always believed that the DWP wrongly stopping Jodey’s benefits caused her death and the High Court’s refusal caused such disappointment not just for me and my family, but others too who have lost loved ones after DWP mistakes and who continue to fight for accountability from the DWP. This is a victory not just for us but for all those families and others still on the receiving end of awful treatment by the DWP. I hope the DWP learn from their tragic failings.”

Merry Varney, partner at Leigh Day, added:

“Today’s unanimous ruling from the court of appeal means finally Joy and her family have the opportunity for the role of shocking failings by the DWP in the death of much loved Jodey to be publicly investigated, and the Court of Appeal has rightly underlined the importance of this not just to Jodey’s family, but to the wider public.

“Inquests play a vital role in exposing unsafe practices and risks to future lives, and today’s Judgement, rejecting arguments made by the Coroner and overturning the decision of the High Court, makes it abundantly clear that Coroners can and indeed sometimes should be investigating more than the immediate cause of death regardless of whether the right to life is engaged.”

Joy is represented by Jeremy Hyam KC of 1 Crown Office Row and Jesse Nicholls of Matrix Chambers and her case is funded by legal aid.

Timeline

  • In late 2016 the DWP began to reassess Jodey’s entitlement to Employment Support Allowance (ESA). Jodey requested a home visit as she rarely left the house due to her health and she made clear in her reply that she had “suicidal thoughts a lot of the time and could not cope with work or looking for work”.
  • Despite this, the DWP decided that Jodey should attend a work capability assessment in January which Jodey did not attend and on 6 February 2017 the DWP decide to stop the fortnightly ESA payments which Jodey relied on from 17 February.
  • Jodey with the help of her family wrote to the DWP explaining the severity of her health conditions and asking them to reconsider their decision to terminate her ESA, but this did not happen until after her death.
  • Jodey also then received letters to inform her that her housing benefit and council tax benefit would be stopped because they were linked to her ESA.
  • Just three days after her last ESA payment, on the 21 February, Jodey took her own life.
  • On 24 May 2017 an inquest was held into Jodey’s death at Teesside Coroner’s Court.
  • Jodey’s family initially wrote to the Attourney General in January 2020 to seek his permission to apply to the High Court for a second inquest.
  • This was granted and the application to the High Court was submitted in December 2020.
  • In June 2021 the DWP was given permission to have a limited role in making submissions to the court about the second inquest application.
  • In September 2021 the High Court ruled that that the new evidence that had come to light since the first inquest did not require a fresh inquest to be held in the interests of justice.
  • Joy sought permission to appeal that decision on 1 Oct 2021 but this was refused on 11 October 2021
  • An application to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal was submitted on 2 November 2021 and permission was granted on 5 October 2022
  • On January 31 and February 1 2023 the Court of Appeal heard Joy’s arguments for the appeal.

So: no date for the new inquest – yet. This Site will try to keep you informed.

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DWP warns households they may not get cost of living payment next week

For once, this is not about the Department for Work and Pensions deliberately making our lives harder.

It seems to be a simple warning that it’s impossible to get the second instalment of the cost of living payment out to all households at the same time.

And, in fairness, while the payment starts to be dished out on Tuesday (November 8), the deadline isn’t until November 23 (November 30 for people on tax credits and legacy benefits).

Here’s the story from My London:

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has issued an urgent warning to households who are expecting the second instalment of the cost of living payment next week. The government department has said that not everyone should expect the payment to arrive on Tuesday, November 8.

Around eight million families are set to receive the payment, which aims to support qualifying low-income households with the rise in the cost of living. The £324 payment is the second lump sum of a £650 payment.

The first payments of £326 were made from July 14 onwards. For the second instalment, the DWP has warned that “a small number” of households will receive payments on November 8, with “numbers increasing significantly” from November 9 onwards, reports Liverpool Echo. The deadline for most payments to be made is November 23.

It is thought that families in receipt of Tax Credits and other eligible legacy benefits will get their money from November 23-30.

Source: DWP’s urgent warning to households expecting cost of living payment next week

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Why are second home owners getting Rishi Sunak’s £400 energy bill discount TWICE?

Rishi Sunak: he has found a way to make sure rich people get twice or three times as much help from his energy bill discount as people who genuinely need the money. How utterly disgusting.

Rich people who have second homes will receive Rishi Sunak’s energy bill discount twice, in a slap in the face for people who are in genuine energy poverty.

Those with three homes will receive £1,200 – of which two-thirds of the money would be better-spent on people in real need.

Obviously, nobody can live in two or three houses at the same time, so there is no reason for these people – 772,000 with two houses, 61,000 with three (including Sunak himself) should receive these huge extra amounts.

The total amount of extra money being paid out to rich people is £357,600,000. They don’t need it; they won’t use it to cover extra heating costs – and vows to donate it to charity miss the point.

There has been criticism of Rishi Sunak’s energy bill discount after it was revealed that second home owners will get it twice – double the £400 received by others.

The Treasury has confirmed that this applies to every individual house – including second homes.

Rishi Sunak has found a way to turn an offer of help to people suffering energy poverty as a result of stupid Tory political policies into a grubby handout of public money to rich private homeowners. What a dirty trick.

Source: Second home owners rewarded as they will get Rishi Sunak’s £400 energy bill discount twice

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Tories u-turn on limits to MPs’ second jobs – so their gravy train doesn’t stop?

Master and servant: Owen Paterson with his former boss, Peter Fitzgerald of Randox. They parted company shortly after Paterson stopped being an MP, which suggests that – rather than working for the people of North Shropshire – Paterson was really Randox’s inside man in Parliament.

Here’s an example of Tory greed at its worst.

Last year, after Owen Paterson ended up resigning as an MP because he had been found to have lobbied hard for at least one of several other employers, Boris Johnson promised curbs on the kind of secondary employment MPs could take.

But that was last year.

It seems he thinks we’ve all forgotten and he can signal the all-clear for his MP buddies (not all of them Tories!) to “Carry On Lobbying”.

Here are the details from the BBC News website:

Limiting the amount of time MPs spend on second jobs would be “impractical”, the government has said.

Boris Johnson called for a review of MPs’ outside work last year after a number of high-profile controversies.

At the time, the prime minister backed proposals to place “reasonable limits” on hours spent on other jobs.

MPs later backed government plans to prevent them taking on certain jobs, with No 10 saying any outside role, paid or unpaid, should be “within reasonable limits” and not stop MPs fully serving their constituents.

A definition of what that meant was not given, but International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggested 15 hours a week as a reasonable limit.

But Cabinet Office Minister Steve Barclay has now said the measure would not work and also cast doubt on a proposed cap on outside earnings.

“The imposition of time limits would not necessarily serve to address recent concerns over paid advocacy and the primary duty of MPs to serve their constituents.”

When it came to a cap on earnings, Mr Barclay also had his doubts, writing that such a rule “could serve to prohibit activities which do not bring undue influence to bear on the political system”, such as writing books.

He said a long-serving MP “could inadvertently reach the ‘ceiling’ through earnings accrued over time”, and he questioned “whether it would be fair to subject that member to a standards investigation”.

He added: “To avoid this issue would require a substantive earning threshold to be set such that it would not serve to prevent MPs from taking on outside work for which they were properly remunerated in line with salaries in that sector.

“The introduction of such an arbitrary cap therefore may not have the intended effect of ensuring that members prioritise their parliamentary duties and the needs of their constituents.”

Why not just combine time limits with a ban on lobbying for firms that employ them, then?

(I’ll tell you why: no firm would then wish to employ them. Randox and Owen Paterson parted company as soon as he left Parliament.)

The u-turn provoked a sharp reaction from the pundits on the BBC’s Politics Live…

Making an announcement in the middle of a war keeps it off the front pages, said Ed Vaizey.

He – a Tory – admitted it should be possible to limit the number of hours an MP works for other employers, and it should be possible to limit earnings.

And Stella Creasy said it isn’t hard to work out what is fair: if someone is a doctor it is fair to expect them to do a bit of practice to keep their skills up. “But you don’t need to practise to make a million pounds sitting in the British Virgin Islands [as former Attorney General Geoffrey Cox did] … it looks bad for all of us.”

She continued: “The public are looking at us with horror. The question isn’t how many hours – it’s ‘where do you find the time?’ There is quite a lot on, right now!”

Even Torygraph columnist Madeline Grant said: “Boris Johnson is very good at promising things in the short term to get out of trouble and then reverse-ferreting.”

She added: “They should have been looking at probity and conflict of interest, which is why the Owen Paterson scandal was so appalling.”

“I think they just bottled it,” said Miatta Fahnbulleh of the New Economics Foundation. “This might come back to bite them because it leaves a bad taste in people’s mouths.

“Being an MP is really hard; it is a full-time, pretty intense, full-on job, and for constituents [the question is] is your attention, is your priority, is your care divided? If you’re earning 200-300 grand in that other job you’d be right to feel that’s more of a priority.”

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#BorisJohnson #sleaze #scandal of the day: another MP with a second job

Coward: Boris Johnson hid in a fridge once to evade difficult questions.

Boris Johnson is facing tricky questions again:

Apparently Winchester MP Stephen Brine repeatedly claimed on the public Register of Members’ Interests that he’d been given the green-light to take a £1,600-a-month job with Sigma Pharmaceuticals by a Parliamentary watchdog, just months after quitting as a Public Health minister in March 2019.

This was not true, it seems. And the company was given a Covid-19 contract worth £100,000 subsequently. Did Brine act as a lobbyist? Both he and the firm deny it. But they would, wouldn’t they?

And with corruption in government at an all-time high, it seems unlikely that we’ll get the facts, whether they’re innocent or not.

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.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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MPs in safe seats are more likely to abuse the security by taking second jobs. Proportional Representation, anyone?

 

Geoffrey Cox: he has a safe seat, so he felt perfectly comfortable taking a second job and treating his Parliamentary work as a hobby.

 

Suddenly proportional representation is looking like the wise choice after all – isn’t it, Britain?

Some might say the result of the 2011 referendum on whether to introduce proportional representation for Parliamentary elections in the UK was a dire warning of the corruption that we see in government today. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

The bid to introduce a fairer voting system was resoundingly defeated by a 68 per cent of votes against to only 32 per cent for, on a turnout of 42 per cent of the electorate.

I wonder if the survivors of the other 58 per cent of registered voters at the time regret not bothering to turn up now they know that the result meant a continuation of “safe seats”, allowing the MPs who occupy them to corrupt themselves with second jobs with impunity.

You see, the current First Past The Post system lends itself to tribal voting, meaning that areas that traditionally vote for a particular party are likely to see that party’s representative into Parliament at every election, because there only needs to be enough of them to see off all the other contenders individually.

It means a minority of voters can impose their will – or, more realistically, the real plans behind the lies that their favoured party told to get elected – on the majority.

Do you think most of the UK wants the NHS carved up by a cabal of private corporations? Of course not – around 70 per cent of voters want full re-nationalisation. But that won’t stop the Tories taking it another step towards full privatisation – the exact opposite of what we want – on Tuesday.

By the same token, the individuals occupying those safe seats know that they’re unlikely to be voted out, so they know they can take second jobs and rake in the cash.

As the Guardian article states, the facts “undermine Boris Johnson’s suggestion that voters who disapprove of their MP’s outside work can simply unseat them at an election”.

Either that damned fool spoke without thinking (yet again), or he simply lied. Neither alternative is acceptable in a prime minister but – oh! He’s in a safe Tory seat! So you can’t vote him out.

You see how it works?

Pretty much all of the problems we have with our democracy today stem from the fact that in 2011 the UK voted not to have one.

Clive Lewis’s words (above) are absolutely true – but there is a fatal flaw.

The 2011 referendum was a once-in-a-lifetime situation, forced by the fact that the Tories had failed to win a majority in Parliament and a referendum was a condition of their coalition with the Liberal Democrats.

Now we live in a dictatorship where Boris Johnson lied his way to an 80-seat Conservative majority. Neither he nor any Tory who replaces him will ever allow another referendum because they know it would end the dictatorship they have lied so hard to achieve.

And we’re unlikely to see another hung Parliament for the foreseeable future because the main opposition party – Labour – is currently run by a red Tory wetwipe who probably couldn’t win an election if he was the only candidate.

Public opinion might push Johnson towards a gesture of some sort, but it won’t be much. He has already watered down plans to restrict MPs from holding second jobs.

And this week he can distract us all with the votes on the NHS and on asylum seekers.

Bread and circuses. It’s a tactic that has worked since Roman times – because you’re always going to fall for it. Or will you..?

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.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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