Boris Johnson accused over hedge funds' election donations | Politics | guardian.co.uk .
Boris Johnson, who is leading the fight against a European crackdown on City financiers, faced accusations of being "bought off" today, when it emerged that more than half the money donated to his mayoral campaign came from the financial sector including hedge funds and private equity
Unsurprising but also revealing the complete hypocrisy of the Tories when they seek to limit union funding of the Labour Party.
It is obvious the need now is for state funding of political parties. This is what will preserve democracy. I note in this context the follwoing comment:
Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, the former Danish prime minister said: "Hedge funds are buying off the Tories and Boris Johnson, which shows that they want to remain above the law. This will reinforce democratic efforts to introduce better regulation in the wake of the financial crisis."
I am sure this is true, and that if the Tories get in the pressure on London will be enormous. After all, when they choose to ally with neo-Nazis in Europe what friends will they have?
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See also http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/oct/09/boris-johnson-ken-livingstone-standard – how Johnson tried to promote former Evening Standard editor, despite her having no qualifications for the job,as a thank you for the hatchet job she did on Ken before the mayoral elections.
I recently emailed his chief economic adviser and received an extremely curt reply which chimed well with what we know about the political climate in London now.
Johnson is no joke – he’s a seriously dangerous man.
“revealing the complete hypocrisy of the Tories when they seek to limit union funding of the Labour Party.”
The Tories haven’t sought to limit union funding. All they have said is that they would only agree to a cap on individual donations in the event that there is a similar cap on union donations. So not hypocritical at all. The hypocrisy is with the Labour Party, who refused that reasonable offer because the unions bankroll the Party.
Richard,
It is a simple untruth to say that the Tories ally with neo-Nazis. They ally with Latvians and those Latvians in turn commemorate those Latvians who fought with the Nazis to free Latvia from Soviet occupation.
I know you believe that all small jurisdictions are beneath contempt, and you probably believe that the Latvians actually benefitted from being under Russian occupation as part of the Soviet “Union” (as ever, that word tells its own story) for some 40 years after the war ended. However, the Latvians felt that the Nazis offered them the chance to liberate themselves from the Russians, and who can blame them?
I think the rest of us would generally try to steer clear of judging people based on their own national history which we do not understand. How would you describe someone that was an ally of Sinn Fein, for example?
Judge people on their policies: if you are reduced to trying to slur them by calling their allies names based on a simplistic view of history then you really have lost the argument.
Whether or not the Latvian party are nazis, the tories won’t get a seat at the top table of europe by allying themselves with the rag tag and bobtail of right wing parties it has chosen instead of the more mainstream christian democratic parties of the larger european countries.
what a strange headline you use for this. The Guardian is not so bold, and instead refers to the financial sector, including hedge funds and private equity, and makes it clear this was part of his support. But so what? Given that there are so many bankers in london it is perhaps not surprising that Boris’s backers included bankers. I wonder how many union members support Boris and would prefer that if their union want to support a policitician that should be Boris.
Mad
Read the background to this
The Tory allies are from the very dangerous far right
Can you really say otherwise of homophobic, anti semiotic, Waffen SS apologists?
I never thought I’d see the day when a mainstream British party was so far removed from the accepted mainstream of ethical conduct
Richard
Richard,
I see the Guardian yesterday was describing as anti-semitic a Polish politician who has been supported by the Jewish Chronicle. Funny old world. But without wishing to be decried as a xenophobe, as soon as you move east of Berlin or south of Provence people pretty quickly become homophobic and racist. Watch what happens at any football game in Spain, southern Italy or the Balkans and you’ll see the proof. The British are, although we beat ourselves up, a wonderfully tolerant lot and pretty much always have been (unless you’re a Catholic, of course).
The crux of Europe is all this talk of allies misses the point that they are allied in not wanting an ever expanding Europe that has no democratic mandate. To go back to the Waffen point, nobody criticises Churchill for being an ally of the genocidal Stalin. You can’t criticise allies without looking at what they are allied against. You don’t seem to have a problem with a political system that demands a new referendum when the first result is unacceptable. Or with a governing party that promises a referendum in its election mandate and then reneges on the promise. And then the leader of that party is mooted for a job as the head of the EU. Do you really think that is not “far removed from the accepted mainstream of ethical conduct”?
Do you really mean to tell me that openly lying in your manifesto and then using that lie for your own personal advantage is now acceptable?
Frankly, I believe we should always take a stand against political lies and corruption. I had hoped you would take the same view.
Also, although it is a mispelling, I do like the idea of people being anti-semiotic.
[…] credibility of all it says. But they resist regulation supported by those like Boris Johnson , who get into office on the back of the ‘donations’ they made to his campaign: a ruse about as dishonest as the […]