The last fortnight and a half has been a very long one for Damian Green and his family.
It was back on 27th November that the shadow immigration minister was arrested and questioned for having received and then made public leaked information from the Home Office, as a squad of anti-terror police raided his Commons office and scoured his homes, seizing papers, telephones and computer equipment in the process.
Today, there are reports in the Sunday Telegraph and Sunday Times which state that the police are preparing to drop the case against him, not least because of the "bungled and possibly unlawful way in which his House of Commons office was searched".
ConservativeHome has previously made it clear that we believe Damian Green was acting in the public interest and guilty of nothing more than doing his job, so any suggestion that the case is to be dropped must be welcomed.
However, it may not be until he is due to answer bail in February that he is officially given the all clear. For the sake of him, his family and the wider political process, the sooner this can be done the better.
And only then will Damian Green be able to give a full account of events, which will doubtless raise a further raft of questions about how an Opposition MP came to be treated in this way.
Jonathan Isaby
If the case is dropped, is there any way he can sue for wrongful arrest? If so, the ensuing case would be fascinating.
Also, could anyone bring a case against the Home Office for wasting police time?
Any other cases that could be brought forward?
Posted by: Anonymous Eurocrat | December 14, 2008 at 10:10
Who knows if its true. Sunday Times and Sunday Telegraph often take a speculative punt together to cover their bottoms when they have no idea what's going on.
Posted by: David Smith | December 14, 2008 at 10:24
When will his resources be returned to him? Or is the police allowed to just steal people's personal property now?
Posted by: Tom FD | December 14, 2008 at 11:34
Well I suppose with pictures of the dear leader in city suit, centre frame, surrounded by soldiers in desert gear, is considered a powerful enough sound bite, to capture the attention of the masses for this week! So the previous 'soound-bite' to distract the masses can perhaps be dropped.
Interesting that Peter Oborne in his page in the Mail yesterday had a small section at the bottom of the page entitled:- 'Is Mr. Straw really as innocent as he claims?'
This little nugget of news is also about the leaking of papers and more than once - apparently. On one occasion Mr. Straw had been a suspect in a police inquiry into the leaking of Cabinet papers. But in a revalation that he made last Tuesday 'Straw gleefully declared that he was exonerated: 'I'm not in favour of leaking,' he told MP's, 'and I don't do it.'
Peter Oborne continues: 'Curiously, however, the Justice Secretary kept quiet about the fact that, at the same time, he was involved in another much more serious leak inquiry.
'He was interviewed not by the Metropolitan Police, but by MI5. The culprit has never been identified and, while there is no proof that Straw was guilty, his conduct was highly questionable and has never been properly explained.'
The rest of the article is a description of what this case was about, and Peter Oborne finishes --
'One day, Jack Straw owes the British public a full accoount of his walk-on role in the Norman Scott affair and the downfall of Jeremy Thorpe.'!
Posted by: Patsy Sergeant | December 14, 2008 at 11:58
ConHome states "we believe Damian Green was acting in the public interest and guilty of nothing more than doing his job". The phrase 'pull the other one its got bells on it' springs to mind.
Posted by: jailhouselawyer | December 14, 2008 at 12:41
Jailhouselawyer 12:41:
You are obviously a troll, I have to wonder why you guys bother?
"Pull the other one, its got bells on it?"
Yeah. Alarm bells. Another sign of this crumbling government's desperation.
Everybody knows this whole thing is a farce. Everybody knew it weeks ago, actually.
The police are hopefully about to confirm it in short order. And rightly so. The whole debacle makes me feel physically ill.
Posted by: Steve Tierney | December 14, 2008 at 13:01
"ConservativeHome has previously made it clear that we believe Damian Green was acting in the public interest and guilty of nothing more than doing his job, so any suggestion that the case is to be dropped must be welcomed".
Sir Gus O'Donell, head of the Civil Service, seemed to believe that leaks were not in "the public interest" and called in police.
I believe the media when it seems to be reporting that the CPS will drop the case, (which will come as no surprise). It will be interesting to see if Green will sue police for unlawful arrest and unlawful entry into his office?
What about the hapless Galley and the concerns of Sir Gus O'Donell?
Posted by: Dontmakemelaugh | December 14, 2008 at 13:03
So tell me, JailHouseLawyer, which of the 12 stories was not in the public interest, in your opinion? Hmm? You must believe that one of these stories had no place in the public realm if you disagree that Damian Green was doing his job and acting in the public interest.
Posted by: StevenAdams | December 14, 2008 at 13:21
If the Conservative Party win the next election will they do nothing about any leak that occurs under there watch. Of course not. If someone is leaking on a large scale then they must be found and duly punished.
I am afraid there as been lot of political hypocrisy about this subject during the last few weeks.
Posted by: Jack Stone | December 14, 2008 at 13:47
I've read the Telegraph story today.
Unfortunately, these days the Telegraph seems to function as a conduit between the government spin machine and middle-class Britain. Interest in this story therefore centres on the clues it gives as to how the government intends to extricate itself from something designed from the outset to operate to its advantage, but which has subsequently blown up massively and messily all over them.
The line seems to me to be that Green is criminally guilty, but may be allowed to get away with it. Known Labour web trolls like jailhouse lawyer (above) are part of the theme. Basically, while they carry on baying for blood, the government will drop the investigation on grounds of "technicalities". The overall impression, the intent of the spin, is designed to be of a guilty man (and his colleagues, by association), walking away scot-free as a result of legal procedural issues which really should be changed - maybe even "brought into the modern age".
In reality, of course, the idea is to try to save the neck of the Home Secretary, whose statements on the matter (while there was a chance that it would go the government's way) were, to say the least, entirely inconsistent with the case being dropped. We should be ready for how the end-game to the Green affair is about to be played. In truth, if you go back over the things Smith has said (with the likes of Brown, Straw and Harman by her side and nodding sagely), with the knowledge that the case is to be dropped, then you can only conclude that she should resign.
Posted by: JohnfromCamberley | December 14, 2008 at 13:48
Jack Stone - you seem to be part of the spin conspiracy too!
Let's just be clear. If someone leaks in the way that Galley is alleged to have done, however honourable his motives (as we would see them), then that is a breach of employment terms and conditions, so he or she should expect the sack. Can anyone here see Galley keeping his current job? No. The same would presumably apply to leakers in future Conservative governments.
On the other hand, in the absence of national security implications, it is unreasonable now, and in the future, to expect the criminal law to be exercised over either the leaker or the leaked-to.
And of course, now and in the future too, if a government uses calculated moves unjustly to criminalise an individual, with the wider objective of smearing the opposition, then they should be condemned absolutely.
If anyone can see any hypocrisy in what I have said (which as far as I know is the position shared by the Conservatives, Lib Dems and even the respectable margin of Labour) then please let me know.
Posted by: JohnfromCamberley | December 14, 2008 at 14:05
Thank goodness the anti-terror squad didn't suspect him of anything more serious, else he could have been thrown into gaol for 6 weeks without charge.
Posted by: Adam in London | December 14, 2008 at 14:32
John from Camberley:
You have noticed as well.
Posted by: SuperBlue | December 14, 2008 at 15:15
Steve Tierney: Obviously not. It may have something of the farce about it, nevertheless I do not accept Green's claim that he has done nothing wrong and that the police arrested him for doing his job.
StevenAdams: The Tory party is not in the public interest, that defence is for genuine whistleblowers not moles.
Posted by: jailhouselawyer | December 14, 2008 at 17:23
Most of the information that is leaked is relatively routine information about how services are performing. It is stuff that should be available by rights and if it was, govt, the public and the press would get over the novelty, would adjust and the system would become more mature about its analysis and how it conducts itself.
Posted by: Matt Wright | December 14, 2008 at 18:41
Damian Green was arrested merely for doing his duty as an elected MP. He has no real case to answer! As far as I know, he was behaving "in the public interest". Ignore the spin and hypocrisy from our opponents on the left!
Posted by: Julian L Hawksworth | December 14, 2008 at 22:05
jailhouselawyer @ 17.23 'The Tory party is not in the public interest....'
Well neither is the Labour party in the public interest! As maybe even you might discover in the months to come, although perhaps as a lawyer, the worst effects of the recession won't touch you as much as others! The Labour party is well endowed with lawyers.
Posted by: Patsy Sergeant | December 15, 2008 at 00:04
Patsy Sergeant: I suspected I would get that response, and would agree that neither is the Labour government in the public interest. However, you are wrong about my finances. I felt the pinch long before the economic downturn was publicly announced. I maybe poor, still, I feel rich in the knowledge that I have Jack Straw's nuts in a firm grip and am about to squeeze the nutcrackers over his procrastination in relation to prisoners and the vote.
Posted by: jailhouselawyer | December 15, 2008 at 12:12
JohnfromCamberley is absolutely right
Posted by: Mrs Campbell | December 15, 2008 at 14:07
This is what the European Parliament says in a draft report hectoring Macedonia:
"Observes that, in a democracy, interaction occurs between the government and the opposition in which there is always room for conflicting opinions, attention is paid to alternative solutions and there is scope for establishing majorities in favour of a change of policy...Observes that in 2008 arrests of politicians were accompanied by much demonstrative publicity for them on television, observes that, unless such arrests lead to legal proceedings, they may give rise to a suspicion that they are being used as an instrument to intimidate political opponents..."
How sad that it has come to this - that the European Union has a better understanding of loyal opposition than the Government of Great Britain. Where are the resignations? Where are the street protests? Where is the rebellion?
Posted by: Freedom Fighter | December 15, 2008 at 21:06
"Damian Green's case set to be dropped"
I do hope so, although it was wonderful to see Labour Squirm.
Posted by: The Bishop Swine | December 15, 2008 at 22:09