1550 [1540] Hrs GMT
London
Friday
19 November 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
BHANGEELAAR! Putting in context the Ghostly antics of the UK House of Peers! David Young is condemned to quit and then Harriet-Kinnock prop up ‘the Oona’!
From the web site of the Guardian:
Party donors and
political apparatchiks
appointed working peers
Controversy as political donors are elevated to Lords alongside media figures including Downton Abbey writer Julian Fellowes and broadcaster Joan Bakewell
The controversy over honours for political benefactors was reopened today with the appointment of a clutch of party donors and political apparatchiks as working peers.
The millionaire car importer Bob Edmiston, who gave £2m to the Tories, the Conservative party treasurer Stanley Fink, and the Labour donor Sir Gulam Noon were among 54 new working peers announced by Downing Street today.
Howard Flight, a former deputy chairman of the Conservative party, and Tina Stowell, a former deputy chief of staff to William Hague when he was opposition leader, were also on the list.
Better-known names include the screenwriter Julian Fellowes, celebrity divorce solicitor Fiona Shackleton and the former defence chief General Sir Richard Dannatt.
Fellowes, an actor and novelist, is enjoying a moment of fame as creator of the ratings-winning ITV series Downton Abbey. He will sit on the Conservative benches.
Shackleton will also take her seat as a Tory peer. She is best known for representing Prince Charles during his divorce from Princess Diana, and Paul McCartney during the former Beatle's battle with his ex-wife Heather Mills.
Dannatt, the former chief of the general staff who clashed with the last Labour government over Afghanistan, was nominated by David Cameron when he was leader of the opposition, but has chosen to sit as a crossbench peer.
A number of media figures will enter the Lords: Michael Grade, the former chief executive of Channel 4, the broadcaster Dame Joan Bakewell and the editor in chief of the Wall Street Journal Europe, Patience Wheatcroft. Grade and Wheatcroft will sit as Conservatives; Bakewell is a Labour nominee.
Others promoted include: Rachel Heyhoe-Flint, the former captain of England women's cricket team, Susan Kramer, the ousted Liberal Democrat MP, and Oona King, the former MP recently beaten by Ken Livingstone in the contest to become Labour's next candidate for mayor of London.
The inclusion of Edmiston and Noon, who were questioned under caution as part of the 2007 police inquiry into whether loans were made in return for the promise of an honour, may prove controversial. The Scottish National party MP Angus MacNeil, whose complaint to police sparked the cash-for-honours inquiry, said: "David Cameron should be mindful of the mess Tony Blair found himself in over the appointment of party donors to the Lords.
"There should be no link between donations and peerages, but we again have big donors being elevated to the Lords. This is supposed to be a democracy, but the UK parliament now has more unelected peers than it has elected MPs – another reason Scotland would be better off with independence."
No charges were brought after the cash-for-honours investigation, which concluded without a prosecution.
Cameron's spokesman, asked about the donations controversy, said: "There is an established process on appointing peers, and that is that they are vetted through the House of Lords appointments commission, and there is an established process on donations, which is that they have to be declared to the Electoral Commission."
Peter Facey, the director of the pressure group Unlock Democracy, said: "If politicians and prime ministers want to reward their friends, instead of sending them to the House of Lords, what's wrong with a gold watch?
"People who make and amend our laws should be elected by the public, not selected for good deeds done in the past by grateful politicians.
"House of Lords reform is long overdue, yet despite much talk from this government we have yet to see concrete proposals.
"We await the government's proposals with baited breath. We don't want this to turn into another broken promise. Until then these appointments will stick in the throat."
Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, said: "I am delighted with the new Labour peers that will be joining our team in the House of Lords. They are all excellent appointments and they will be working peers who will actively hold the government to account.
"They were chosen for their experience across a broad range of fields, and I am sure that they will add to the work of parliament."
The full list of peers
Conservative party
• Tariq Ahmad – businessman and former vice-chairman of the Conservative party.
• Sir Robert Balchin DL – pro-chancellor of Brunel University.
• Elizabeth Berridge – director of the Conservative Christian Fellowship.
• Sir Michael Bishop CBE – career in civil aviation, chairman of the Michael Bishop Foundation.
• Alistair Cooke OBE – career in education, authorship and politics.
• Sir Patrick Cormack – former Conservative MP.
• Michael Dobbs – author, presenter and adviser to Margaret Thatcher and John Major.
• Robert Edmiston – businessman and charity campaigner.
• Sir Reg Empey OBE – Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party 2005-10.
• Andrew Feldman – businessman and co-chairman of the Conservative party.
• Julian Fellowes DL – actor, novelist, film director and screenwriter.
• Stanley Fink – chief executive of International Standard Asset Management and Chairman of Earth Capital LLP. Treasurer of the Conservative party.
• Howard Flight – career in finance; held various positions in Conservative shadow cabinet, deputy chairman of the Conservative party 2004-05.
• David Gold – senior litigation partner at Herbert Smith LLP.
• Michael Grade CBE – past chief executive of Channel 4 television and former executive chairman of ITV plc.
• Rachael Heyhoe-Flint OBE DL – past captain of England women's cricket team, currently public relations and sports marketing consultant.
• Anne Jenkin – charitable and political work for the Conservative party.
• Sir Michael Lord – former Conservative MP and former deputy speaker of the House of Commons.
• Rt Hon David Maclean – former Conservative MP; held a number of ministerial posts; opposition chief whip 2001-05.
• George Magan – career in finance; former Conservative party treasurer and deputy chairman of the Conservative Party Foundation.
• Sir Bernard Ribeiro CBE FRCS – retired consultant general surgeon; member of the Health Policy Research Advisory Board of the American College of Surgeons.
• Fiona Shackleton LVO – lawyer specialising in family law.
• Richard Spring – former Conservative MP.
• Tina Stowell MBE – former head of BBC corporate affairs; past deputy chief of staff to William Hague as leader of the opposition.
• Nicholas True CBE – past deputy head of the PM's policy unit; former private secretary to the leader of the opposition in the House of Lords; leader of Richmond borough council.
• Patience Wheatcroft – editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal Europe.
• Gordon Wasserman – internationally recognised expert on management of police forces.
Liberal Democrat party
• Dr Sarah (Sal) Brinton – executive director of the Association of Universities in the East of England.
• Dee Doocey OBE – chair of the London assembly.
• Qurban Hussain – deputy group leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Luton borough council.
• Judith Jolly – chair of executive committee of Liberal Democrats in Devon and Cornwall.
• Susan Kramer – former Liberal Democrat MP.
• Raj Loomba – businessman and campaigner for widows' rights.
• Jonathan Marks – commercial and family law QC with specialist interest in human rights and constitutional reform.
• Monroe Palmer OBE – Liberal Democrat councillor and chair of Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel.
• Jenny Randerson – Liberal Democrat member of the National Assembly for Wales for Cardiff Central, former Minister in the Welsh assembly government.
• John Sharkey – chairman of the Liberal Democrat 2010 General Election campaign.
• Nicol Stephen – former deputy first minister of Scotland (2005–07) and leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats (2005–08).
• Ben Stoneham – Liberal Democrat HQ operations director.
• Mike Storey CBE – primary school headteacher, former leader of Liverpool city council, Liberal Democrat councillor and former lord mayor of Liverpool.
• Paul Strasburger – businessman and philanthropist.
• Claire Tyler – chief executive of Relate.
Labour party
• Dame Joan Bakewell DBE – writer and broadcaster.
• Ray Collins – general secretary of the Labour party.
• Maurice Glasman – senior lecturer in political theory at London Metropolitan University and for his work with London Citizens.
• Jonathan Kestenbaum – businessman and chief executive of National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.
• Oona King – head of diversity at Channel 4 television and former Labour MP; currently journalist and presenter.
• Ruth Lister – emeritus professor of social policy at Loughbrough University.
• Eluned Morgan – former Labour MEP representing Mid and West Wales; currently honorary distinguished professor at Cardiff University and for her work on low carbon energy.
• Sir Gulam Noon MBE – chairman and founder of Noon Products and of the Noon Foundation.
• Stewart Wood – former Downing Street and Treasury special adviser, lecturer at University of Oxford; previously Fellow of Magdalen College and co-founder of Nexus.
• Bryony Worthington – career focusing on promoting environmental and social change.
Plaid Cymru
• Rt Hon Dafydd Wigley – former Leader of Plaid Cymru; honorary president of Plaid Cymru.
Crossbencher
General Sir Richard Dannatt GCB CBE MC DL, former chief of the general staff
Oona King London Mayoral Campaign meeting at Weston Park School. Crouch End
Oona King to
take up peerage
in the
House of Lords
Friday, 19 November, 2010
12:24 PM
Oona King, the former Bethnal Green and Bow MP, is set to be named as a peer in the House of Lords.
Ms King, who unsuccessfully ran to be the Labour Party’s nomination for the Mayor of London this year, is on a list of 53 nominees put forward to take up a seat in Parliament’s upper house.
She will take her place on the Labour benches alongside 10 new peers, including the broadcaster Dame Joan Bakewell.
The Conservative Party will have 27 new peers and the Liberal Democrats 15 and the new appointments will take the membership of the House of Lords up to nearly 750.
Ms King was the Bethnal Green and Bow MP from 1997 until 2005, when she lost her seat to Respect candidate George Galloway.
The coalition government is set to publish outline plans for future reform of the House of Lords later this year.
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You end the item thus: "The coalition government is set to publish outline plans for future reform of the House of Lords later this year. " Is that the shape of 'reform' that they are going to bring about? What contempt for basic universal standards of ethics, morality. Not to even begin to speak of democracy!
1524 Hrs Friday 19 November 2010
BHANGEELAAR! The Campaign against an elected mayor in Tower Hamlets
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Bhangeelaar!
Friday, November 19, 2010