Events | 2008.10.24
Hugh Muir's Diary
There will be a new age of transparency, says Gordon. Shine a light on government. Shine a light on the financial sector. This from Dai Davies MP: "To ask the prime minister what meetings he has held with representatives of senior management of Lehman Brothers in the last 12 months." And the answer: "My officials and I have meetings with a wide range of organisations and individuals on a range of subjects." Oh well, early days.
• But then that\'s Commons chicanery. What we need is clarity where it really matters, in issues like the nuclear industry. For now that Gordon has said that his vision of the future is nuclear, might we not be a tad worried about the decision of the Japanese-American firm Westinghouse - who would dearly love to supply us with more power stations - to engage the service of Labour\'s favourite lobbyists, Sovereign Strategy? The upside for Westinghouse is the clout carried by Sovereign: its chair, Alan Donnelly - a former Labour leader in the European parliament - is also David Miliband\'s constituency chair. Until last year, Lord Cunningham, described as the man who "has gone further than almost any other Labour politician in supporting nuclear power", was also on the board. But the downside is that if Westinghouse do win contracts, we will never really know how much the decision owed to Sovereign\'s "relationship building and stakeholder engagement support". Still, what we don\'t know can\'t hurt.
• Yes, clarity is essential, for all sorts of reasons. Ask the Ulster Unionist peer Lord Maginnis, who made history this weekend by reversing his party\'s boycott of the British Irish Inter-Parliamentary Body - now called British Irish Parliamentary Assembly. The body was created to boost relations between the Dail and Westminster, as well as the national assemblies in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. With everyone on board, it can start doing that. But it was a close run thing for, until the night before, Maginnis thought the meeting was in Newcastle, County Down; realising his mistake, he had to get up at 4.30am to cover the 260 miles from his home to Newcastle upon Tyne. One giant step for man. One giant leap for sat-nav.
• No such confusion in the Swinton Circle, the bridge between the far right and the outer reaches of the Tory party. They have looked at their group as led by Alan Harvey, a former National Front activist and founder of the Springbok Club. Many just don\'t like it. "Alan Harvey was removed as chairman by the committee in August as he brought a personal feud into a Circle meeting on 22/7 and his conduct was deemed unbecoming of that of a chairman," says the latest newsletter. "He has subsequently been suspended as a member as he attempted to sabotage the meeting held on 3rd September as he contacted the speaker to say that it had been cancelled which was manifestly untrue. He has also sabotaged the Circle\'s website. Fortunately his attempts to stop the meeting going ahead were unsuccessful. AGM should have a discussion on all these events and decide on further action." Deportation? He\'s always said he is fighting BNP infiltration. What to do?
• Because Obama seems a shoo-in, we can tell you that Bill Ayers - his one-time acquaintance and the man Sarah Palin derides as a terrorist - came to London last year and met Ian Bone, the founder of Class War, at the ICA. We don\'t know what was said, but it does place Obama, terrorists and UK anarchists in one short paragraph. See, there\'s Melanie, Fox News, and us.
• Finally amid fresh warnings of recession, Bob Battle - a lawyer from Virginia - tells the Washington Times how we might invest in the future. "If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in Delta Airlines one year ago, you will have $49 today," he says. "If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in AIG one year ago, you will have $33. If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in Lehman Brothers one year ago, you will have $0. But, if you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the aluminium cans for a recycling refund, you would have $214." Who needs Peston?
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