'Spelman in the clear'

That is what the Evening Standard's Paul Waugh is reporting.  I certainly hope so.  Caroline Spelman might never have been my choice for CCHQ but as said at the time she's a woman of integrity and I hope she is exonerated.

Tim Montgomerie

Comments

[Lee Rowlands]

Another leak,send the police into the Standard's office.

[Felicity Mountjoy]

Excellent news and another failure for Crick the muckraker.

[Vincent Wall]

. . and for Guido Felicity.

[Dave Ashman]

This is very good news. Now please will Dave get on with making Eric Pickles chairman? He can move Caroline back to her old job in Local Government, and Eric can get on with he job of bashing the government.

[michael mcgough]

How can this have taken six months to investigate and require further weeks to deliver the result when the result has supposedly been leaked? I do hope that the final report matches the leak.

[John Coles]

Good.
Now she can be fired to make way for a thoroughly capable person - either Eric Pickles or David Davis would cut the mustard.

[David Belchamber]

Michael mcgough mentions the amount of time these investigations take. Was the David Abrahams' investigation ever completed or was it hushed up?

[James Maskell]

I think the Abrahams was completed. He was cleared of any wreongdoing (lack of evidence probably the reason rather than him being cleared properly)

Good to see she has been cleared. Will the Labour figures who have brought the Spelman allegations up on the Commons apologise? Like hell they will.

[RichardJ]

". . and for Guido Felicity."

I'll accept that Guido was wrong when the points here are answered:

http://www.order-order.com/2009/01/if-spelman-is-cleared-it-stinks.html

[michael mcgough]

There has been a tendency of late where politicians have claimed to be cleared when in reality it was a case of no further action being taken.Nothing is certain until the report is published .

[pp]

If we have to have a sleazy tory party in government, it will still be better than the dangerous labour party. Ocassionally picking our pockets, instead sytematically stealing our pensions and savings.

But a non-sleazy tory party would be better...

[Steve Green (Daily Referendum Blog).]

No10 Petition - Gordon Brown to resign for economic incompetence.

[Malcolm Dunn]

I hope if this is true that a full report will be published explaining why she has been cleared.
I do not know whether Caroline Spelman is guilty or not but what she is alleged to have done does not look good.
It seems every politician gets away with it these days. In recent months we've seen Hain, Harman,Alexander even sleazy Levy get away without charge. I think Peter Oborne was right ,at the moment the political class have triumphed.
The fact is we should expect the highest standards from our politicians whether they be Labour or Conservative and if they fail to live up to them they should be dismissed.

[Alan S]

On his blog Paul Waugh simply says "Caroline Spelman will be spared the worst". That's not exoneration.

[Another Richard]

"Good.
Now she can be fired to make way for a thoroughly capable person - either Eric Pickles or David Davis would cut the mustard."

Agreed.

We need a political heavyweight as Party Chairman in the run up to the general election.

[support the strivers]

this didn't have to be so complicated - one single question would have done the trick.

CS says she paid the nanny cash for admin duties and claimed for this. the nannying duties were paid in board and lodging.

So far so good. nothing improper.

she then stopped the admin arrangement (cash) and the nanny just nannied (board and lodging).

was CSpelman ever asked this simple question: did you pay the nanny any cash amounts after the admin arrangement stopped?

i assume the answer is no, she didn't, which is fine.

[Matthew Reynolds]

I want her axed because she is useless - I did not think for one moment that our hapless Chairman was corrupt. Had she done anything wrong it would have been a mistake rather than deliberate. She has been feeble as Party Chairman and either Eric Pickles or Chris Grayling would give Labour a torrid time and no mistake. It is not good enough for our poll lead to be this low in a recession and having a media savvy Party Chairman would help. We need an effective party machine to sell the message to swing voters in about 150 odd seats to give us a decent winning margin at the next general election. Mrs Spelman is not up to it. I remember once on Newsnight Harriet Harman spouted utter lies about the New Deal slashing youth unemployment ( never mind the fact that the under-class has expanded & more youths are economically inactive) - Mrs Spelman did nothing to challenge the Leader of the Commons at all. Simon Heffer tore into Miss Harman with gusto by pointing out that taxes are high on the middle classes & working poor to fund the client state designed to use welfare dependency & an excessive state sector payroll to keep Labour in office. Why did our Party Chairman not say all that with gusto ? She is supposed to be managing and fronting our general election campaign but no one outside of Westminster has ever heard of her - apart from messing up her child care arrangements and making us all look silly. How about a Peerage & the Party Chairmanship for Simon Heffer ? He has sound conservative beliefs and knows all about media management ( as he works in it ) and is great at attacking the Labour Party . The core Conservative vote would be reassured as would anyone seeking an alternative to New Labour rather than the Tories who seek its continuation. Heffer for the Lords and the Chairmanship ! How about PC feebleness being replaced by common-sense and grit ? He could communicate superbly with all those who want Labour and who want a better Conservative Britain!

But as that is unlikely I am certain that Eric Pickles or Chris Grayling would be perfectly alright chairing the party.

[Matthew Reynolds]

I want her axed because she is useless - I did not think for one moment that our hapless Chairman was corrupt. Had she done anything wrong it would have been a mistake rather than deliberate. She has been feeble as Party Chairman and either Eric Pickles or Chris Grayling would give Labour a torrid time and no mistake. It is not good enough for our poll lead to be this low in a recession and having a media savvy Party Chairman would help. We need an effective party machine to sell the message to swing voters in about 150 odd seats to give us a decent winning margin at the next general election. Mrs Spelman is not up to it. I remember once on Newsnight Harriet Harman spouted utter lies about the New Deal slashing youth unemployment ( never mind the fact that the under-class has expanded & more youths are economically inactive) - Mrs Spelman did nothing to challenge the Leader of the Commons at all. Simon Heffer tore into Miss Harman with gusto by pointing out that taxes are high on the middle classes & working poor to fund the client state designed to use welfare dependency & an excessive state sector payroll to keep Labour in office. Why did our Party Chairman not say all that with gusto ? She is supposed to be managing and fronting our general election campaign but no one outside of Westminster has ever heard of her - apart from messing up her child care arrangements and making us all look silly. How about a Peerage & the Party Chairmanship for Simon Heffer ? He has sound conservative beliefs and knows all about media management ( as he works in it ) and is great at attacking the Labour Party . The core Conservative vote would be reassured as would anyone seeking an alternative to New Labour rather than the Tories who seek its continuation. Heffer for the Lords and the Chairmanship ! How about PC feebleness being replaced by common-sense and grit ? He could communicate superbly with all those who want Labour out and who want a better Conservative Britain!

But as that is unlikely I am certain that Eric Pickles or Chris Grayling would be perfectly alright chairing the party.

[David Belchamber]

Thank you, James for letting me know about the Abrahams' case. At the time, it seemed an open and shut case. As I remember, Abrahams allegedly gave large sums of money to a lady (who happened to be a tory voter) to give to the Labour party without mentioning his name.

[Jack Stone]

Caroline Spelman isn`t corrupt but she is stupid for getting herself in this mess in the first place.

[Super Blue]

Spelman "stupid"? If her chairmanship has led to large local election wins, London and Crewe-Nantwich, we need more "stupid" people. Unless Troll-Stone thinks we should have won in Glasgow, that is.

[pp]

Clever move by jack stone - if the fire doesn't need more petrol, pretend to be a fire fighter...

However the fire here seems to be justified - the claim seems to be that you can have a live-in nanny purely for for 'board and lodging' - if that is what the final report claims to beleive, then we are in the land of delusion, deception, lies and dishonesty.

Better than the disaster that is 'labour' - but it won't deliver a conservative party to be proud of.

Get a grip cameron - and deliver on your EPP commitment while you are at it - don't do a blair 'pretty straight forward kind of guy' on us before you are even in power...

I have no doubt that cameron will lead a tory victory, I just hope that he has an eye on his legacy too (Blair should be a warning to all potential PMs - coming in as a 'hero', building great personal wealth, but leaving as a 'sub-zero').

[Joe James B]

It's gone on a bit. I always feared it would end up in HR buried in paperwork and concluding nothing.

[Cleethorpes Rock]

Michael Crick is at it again. Now that his Spelman lies have been shot down, he's muck-raking at CCHQ. Get on the Newsnight website and let the Beeboids know what you think!

[James Maskell]

The problem with Hain, Alexander, Levy, Abrahams et al is that of proving it. If there isnt sufficient evidence of the crime occuring then they have to let them go. We know theres something fishy, but just because something smells fishy doesnt provide guilt.

The law is an ass in this regard.

[Jack Stone]

Superblue of course she was stupid. If she had an ounce of good sense she would have never got into that position to start with.
The good election results were little to do with her. I suspect that a large part of those results were more down to what labour have done than anything she or the Conservative Party have done.