Monday 15 August 2011

Cameron should look around him before he lectures on morality.

 In a speech in Oxfordshire,  Prime Minister said politicians had been unwilling to talk about rights and wrongs, but "moral neutrality" would not "cut it any more". He questioned whether politicians had "the determination to confront the slow-motion moral collapse that has taken place in parts of our country these past few generations".

What abiut his and his fellow MPs morality . During the expenses scandal of the last Parliament it energed that. he habd his felow leading Tories had a strange idea of morality .



David Cameron
The Tory leader put a total of £141,820 on his second home allowance over five years. The majority of Mr Cameron's claims were for mortgage interest and utility bills for his Oxfordshire constituency home.


One exception was a £680 bill for repairs to the property, which included clearing wisteria and vines from a chimney, replacing outside lights and resealing his conservatory's roof. He has agreed to repay the bill for the removal of wisteria.

George Osborne
 The parliamentary authorities considered ts personal website too "political" to be publicly funded, when he was shadow chancellor
After claiming £30 for a private company to host the site, Mr Osborne was told by an official: "I draw your attention to the 'Latest News' section of your webpage. This includes some articles ... which contain clearly political content and are therefore not acceptable on a publicly funded website."


He also put a £440.62 bill for a chauffeur company to drive him from Cheshire to London on 11 November 2005 on expenses.


While the invoice offered a 5 per cent discount for "prompt settlement", Mr Osborne received the full amount.


He has agreed to repay this money.


The records showed he also claimed hundreds of pounds for cleaning and remortgaged his second home in Cheshire, increasing his monthly mortgage interest bill from £1,560 a month to nearly £1,900.

Andrew Lansley
 When shadow health secretary he spent thousands of pounds renovating a thatched Tudor country cottage - and sold it shortly afterwards.


He redecorated with premium paint in some rooms at a cost of £2,000 and spent more than £500 having the driveway re-shingled.


He is then said to have "flipped" his expenses to a Georgian flat in London, and claimed for thousands of pounds in furnishings, including a Laura Ashley sofa.


He will repay £2,600 of decoration fees.

Of course this is smal fry in comparison with the claims for Moat cleaning and Duck Houses of lesser Mps and of course the criminality of of gormer MPs David Chaytor and Eric Illsley  who were both jailed.

But it is typical of MPs who call for morality amongst the poor whilst regarding their expenses as perks and lets face it any local councilman who had behaved in such a cavalier  way with tier expenses would have been disbarred  and jailed.

The idea that someone like Cameron whose wealth and that of his wife  made no difference to his  greedy expenses claim can talk about morality is frankly laughable.and the fact that he and his cabinet ministers can talk about "children without  Fathers ". When their own father method of child rearing was to pack their offspring of to boarding schools as soon as possible  makes it difficult to make me accept that they have any idea of how ordinary people live.

We do need  to accept responsibility for our actions whether its a MP flippimg  his or her second homes or  for receiving stolen goods but as this case of mother jailed after the recent riots for receiving stolen shorts justice is not equitable.

The current situation of selfishness and greed started in the Boardrooms of the city and at the palace of Westminster not on the housing estates of our inner cities.


No comments: