A thousand impossible things on the Breakfast news.
The reporting on Cash for Honours has been coming thick and fast that it's hard to keep up. So I thought I’d helpfully sum up the stories that have appeared in the national news media so informed observers can see all the reports together, and thus understand the truth.
So here's what our media have been telling us over the last few days. I’ve excluded blogs, because blogs are hysterical, poorly sourced and too quick to write up gossip as fact.
First, Ruth Turner sent
an e-mail to Jonathan Powell about cash for honours. Except she
didn't send it and it
wasn't an e-mail. The e-mail was leaked either by
the Police or by
Downing Street or
by both. On the other hand, the e-mail wasn't leaked at all
as journalists were just told about a spoken summary. Then the Government got an injunction to stop this being published to protect Lord Levy*, while the
Police asked for the injunction in order to protect their investigation.
At the same time the
police don't leak and so they have
told journalists the direction of their enquiry, which isn't the Turner document at all, but
a series of meetings. Or
some other documents. Or
Levy bullying Turner. Oh, and the Government have
abandoned Lord Levy and
are trying to pin the blame on him and so they
are publicly backing him.
Still at least the enquiry is
almost complete and a
breakthrough is imminent or
will continue into April, although it will also
last well until May.
So that’s all sorted out then.
*No links for this one, but it was the thrust of the initial broadcast media speculation, before the Police made clear they’d asked for the injunction.
Lord Levy, An apology
Over the last year, we, like other blogs, journalists and
online witchhunters citizen journalists have run articles with headlines like
"SLEAZY LEVY", "THE LORD OF SLEAZEY SLEAZINESS" "COPS SAY LEVY IS BENT" "COPS TO CART OFF LEVY IN CUFFS", "LETS DO THE PERP WALK AGAIN" and "SLEAZY, SLEAZO LEVY IS SLEAZOID SLEAZE"These headlines may have given readers the mistaken impression that sources close to the police were informing us that Lord Levy was as guilty as hell and an untrustworthy little shit to boot.
This impression may have been strengthened by ourt constant references to "Police sources", "Sources close to the prosecution", "Top Cops", "Yates of the Yard" and "Scotland yard tecs"
Since Lord Levy has protested that his treatment in the media is defaming him, it has now become clear to us that our sources were in fact Lord Levy, dressed up as a policeman, in a cunning ruse to wreck any prosecution by ruinging any possibility of his prosecution.
He took us in by wearing a police uniform and sayng
"Ello, Ello, Ello" a lot.
This only goes to show that Lord Levy is a sleazy little shit, who shouldn't be trusted.
(Oh, I should say since I used to work for the labour party, that, No, I've never met Lord Levy, but I have been in the same room as him. Which means his sleaziness may have infected me, virulent as it is)
I find your suggestions intriguing, Mr Campbell
Yesterday Ming Campbell
opened a door into the thinking in the Lib Dems in his speech to the Lib Dems spring forum and revealed a seething mass of contradictions, bitter infighting and personal rivalry.
Breifings were given, contradicted, withdrawn, re-emphasised. IT all seemed to revolve on whether or not the Liberals still cared about PR.
However, despite the post-speech chaos, what Campbell actually said was pretty interesting.
At one level, Campbell's "five tests" for Gordon Brown were a simple restatement of liberal Policy. End ID cards, Focus on Climate change, Focus on Pensions and Child Poverty, End Council Tax and have a pop at George Bush..
Yet textually there's more to it than that.
Campbell roundly attacks Blair and Cameron, but only questions Brown.
He has one attack on Brown, which is:
"This Chancellor of the Exchequer has had more control over the direction of government policy than any Chancellor in living memory.This man, who has written the cheques since 1997, has had unparalleled influence within Whitehall.
Why on earth should we believe that Britain will be better governed if he moves from No 11 Downing Street to No. 10?"but only a few paragraphs before, 3when looking at the New Labour record, he said:
"To be fair, first, on the plus side. Much-needed economic stability brought by independence for the Bank of England – a Liberal Democrat proposal. "At last, the necessary investment in our public services – a Liberal Democrat priority."Which answered his own question.
It's impossible not to read Campbell's questions, challenges, tests for Brown and his repeated emphasis on his interest in Governing as an opening for Gordon Brown to respond to, an opening noticeably not left open to David Cameron.
I doubt he'll want to respond just yet, but this debate is only just beginning...
