Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Lib Dem Voice: Hypocrisy on Parliamentary Expenses


Considering the shenanigans of the likes of John Leech MP the chaps at Lib Dem Voice are laying it on a bit thick over a Tory using a tax-payer funded website to back ET in Crewe and Nantwich. A mistake yes. But hardly showing the ongoing disregard for the separation of party politics and state funding of the boy Leech.

Leech's shenanigans include:

* Clearly overspending on the 2005 General Election, from the obvious underdeclaration of "£17" for total campaign 'phone use to who knows what in his rotten under belly;
* Producing a 2006 "Parliamentary Report" when he'd scarcely been MP for six months, promoting local candidates. AND distributed outside his constituency;
* Producing a 2007 "Parliamentary Report" featuring his key local candidate on the cover, with party political material AND virtually indistinguishable from party political material;
* Producing a variety of 2008 "Parliamentary Reports" most saying they are "part-funded" rather than fully funded by the tax paper and promoting candidates in each ward separately;
* Using a shield P&P on four colour printing that is suspected to have not been produced by the printer specified. This presumably to obscure the true printers who may be 100s or 1000s of miles away AND/OR to compromise the audit trail;

And last, for now, but not least:

* Disappearing some £40,000 of public funds paid to him as Councillor expenses and which he promised to give to Lib Dem funds, which must surely be immoral if not illegal, and which HE HAS NOT IN ANY CASE DONATED. Or at least which have not been recorded as donations.

2 comments:

lorenzo23 said...

His Parliamentary report would be pretty blank if he didn't fill it with Lib-Dem promotion of candidates.

Got up, had breakfast, signed an Early Day Motion, went back to Manchester.

Chris Paul said...

"Signed five Early Day Motions" that should be ... mostly about Grimbsy Town FC and mud flats off Cornwall surfing beeches ... you also forgot "pass go, collect £1,500 a week, plus allowances, scowl, chew wasp, scowl some more" ...