4190 days ago
It seems as if Panorama and The Telegraph have nailed three Lords as well as Sir Patrick Mercer MP for asking questions in Parliament in return for cash. In a just world all would lose their titles and would be charged with something and resign at once. But will the political classes allow four of their own to face real justice? There is not a cat in hell’s chance of this.
Apparently Mercer took 24 hours to decide the “honourable” course of action after the sleazy pig knew that he was to be exposed. And even then he got it wrong. The honourable thing would be to quit as an MP at once without compensation and pay the cash he trousered to a good charity. Instead he keeps the cash and will stay in Parliament for two more years (albeit as an Independent not an Official Tory) trousering a vast wage plus expenses and then get a big payoff.
Mercer – you are not in the slightest bit honourable, you are a sleazy scumbag. But in your defence you are not alone.
How many other MPs are taking cash for arranging passes, asking questions in Parliament and assisting various companies without declaring it? In the Westminster political/media bubble other names crop up again and again. It is just that it is either hard to stand these things up or no-one can really be bothered as when you are all part of the same club, exposes make life just a bit too complicated.
If you think this story ends with Mercer or Labour’s Lord Jack Cunningham (whose dad was also done for political corruption, it is a family trait) you are sadly naïve. All the established parties know that there are rotten apples waiting to be exposed with a blue, red or yellow rosette. This scandal is not one that shows the divisions between the “mainstream” parties but the divisions between a political class united in protecting a corrupt system and their own vested interests, and the rest of us.
