This morning the media is reporting that Boris has been admonished for the late reporting of a part-owenership of a home. In a much more serious attempt to subvert the rules, the Leader of the Opposition has again been reported to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards over his dodgy reporting and attempts to hide his trip to Tunisia in 2014 where he laid a wreaths for the terrorists responsible for the Munich massacre.
Earlier this year, the Labour Leader got off admonishment free as the Commissioner’s office took his declarations at face value. New evidence revealed by Guido shows the Labour Leader imploring staff in emails to cook the books to make the wreath-laying trip artificially appear to have come in under the reporting limit. In reality the ‘supporting evidence’ Corbyn submitted worked against his own case…
Guido’s investigation has led Andrew Bridgen to ask the Commissioner that the original case be re-opened. Read his letter in full here…
Keith Vaz has reported Tory MP Andrew Bridgen to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards – again. Bridgen first complained to the Commissioner about Vaz’s conduct in September 2016 after the Labour grandee was the subject of an infamous newspaper expose. The Commissioner opened an inquiry which was suspended for months due to ‘health reasons’. Almost two years after the coke and rent boys shenanigans, Vaz is in the House the Commissioner’s probe is back on…
At the time Vaz retaliated, complaining about Bridgen to the same watchdog, arguing that any investigation into his conduct was outside the Commissioner’s scope. The Commissioner rejected Vaz’s complaint…
Now Vaz has complained yet again, this time on the grounds that Bridgen has commented on Vaz’s case to the media. Bridgen tells Guido:
“Mr Vaz is clearly somewhat rattled.”
How long will it take the Commissioner to dismiss this one…
A few weeks ago Guido asked what had happened to the Standards Commissioner’s investigation into Keith Vaz, which still hasn’t reported back after nearly a year and a half. Today the ongoing investigations list has been updated to reveal that the Vaz inquiry has been “suspended for medical reasons”. It’s certainly true that Vaz has gone missing in recent weeks – he didn’t vote between 18 October and 13 December and he’s only spoken in the Commons once in the last month. He did however manage a trip to the Middle East earlier this month and to vote on the EU withdrawal bill last week. Get well soon…
UPDATE: Tory MP Andrew Bridgen told Guido:
“It’s deeply disappointing but not surprising. If Vaz is not fit to be held to the standards expected of a parliamentarian then he’s not fit enough to be a parliamentarian and we should be expecting a by-election.”
UPDATE II: Guido is reminded that slippery Vaz also went ill around the time of 2001 election when previous serious allegations against him were made. He went to ground for several weeks and so avoided Michael Crick. It’s hard to doorstep a sick man…
