The Commons sleaze commissioner has ruled Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy did break rules by failing to register fifteen events in his member’s register of interests declaration. Despite this not being Lammy’s first offence, Kathryn Stone has merely rapped him on the knuckles. Fifteen rule breaches certainly trump Sir Keir’s eight…
Stone’s investigation initially began looking at a complaint that Lammy had failed to register eight events between 7th October 2021 and 15th November 2021, however she uncovered a further seven interests that had also been registered late. While her inquiry was coming to a close, Lammy voluntary brought an additional failure to her attention…
The total payment for the eight initial events was a whopping £20,910
The seven further late registrations identified by Stone totalled an additional £14,884.88.
Lammy’s excuse? Ukraine and Coronavirus. Responding in a letter to Stone, he explains how the oversight occurred:
“During this time, the Leader of the Opposition made a surprise reshuffle of his shadow cabinet on 29 November 2021. I was appointed Shadow Foreign Secretary and immediately thrown into urgent briefings on the impending Russia-Ukraine situation which was developing at pace. This was also at the time of increasing coronavirus cases as a result of the Omicron variant which led to workers being encouraged to work from home.
My office was extremely busy dealing with the fallout from the pandemic situation in my constituency of Tottenham. Furthermore, my office manager, who usually has responsibility for such submissions, was on [details redacted] leave. As a result other staff in the office acted up to cover. This meant we were short staffed and extremely busy. This is why the submissions were overlooked and delayed.”
That’s a hell of an excuse…
