I did some tweets on the theme of corruption over the weekend:
I was not alone. This is a powerful thread. I do not know of every fact is true. I have not checked them. But there is a theme to the questions that they raise that does demand answers:
And then we just have to look to the chummery around Johnson:
There is a whiff around all this that is deeply, and even profoundly, unpleasant.
Never before have I felt that matters are so out of control, so corrupt, and so far down a slippery slope.
But that's where they are.
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[…] have mentioned corruption this morning. If you are interested in the video linked in this piece from the International Bar Association is […]
And the actual EVIDENCE for corruption?
I have posted a pile this morning
No, what you have posted is accusation and dare I say it, smear. Not evidence.
For it to be corrupt you have to show a lot more than what you and Sam Bright have. You actually have to show evidence of malfeasance. Poor procurement, value for money and doing business with any of the companies listed does not amount to evidence of corruption on the government’s part.
Now, it would be different if you could prove that they ONLY got the business because of their links to government, or were giving kickbacks etc, that would be a different thing. But you haven’t done anything of the sort. All you have done is make accusations. You have no FACTS to back what you say up – which is really rather important.
I wouldn’t be as comfortable as you seem to be making these accusations of corruption – it’s libel. Sam Bright is careful enough to only frame his articles in saying that procurement might have been wasteful, making no direct mention of corruption but nevertheless alluding to it (again, with no evidence of) but you have gone the whole hog and directly made accusations of corruption, which a few twitter posts do not give you.
The procurement rules were not followed
There were no checks or balances
Possibly a good time to remind ourselves that determining proof is a matter for a judge and jury. Suggesting Richard’s accusations fail on that basis then is clearly invalid.
A couple of points to make here.
“The procurement rules were not followed”
This seems to be the Good Law Project’s argument. The government have responded to this claim in their legal documents, also available on the GLP’s website. The government argues that rules were followed when possible, and only broken by necessity to expedite the purchase and provision of PPE. No doubt you would have also attacked them had they not managed to purchase enough.
https://goodlawproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/PestfixGLD4-1.pdf
I also notice you have written another blog titled “Professional judgement requires that stupid application of conventions be called out” which seems to claim that rules should be set aside when necessary for the sake of common sense. Setting aside tender and bidding processes which take a very long time seem to be a sensible idea in the circumstances. Wouldn’t you agree?
None of this though is the same as corruption – which is a very different thing.
“There were no checks or balances”
This is simply not true. Once again the government’s response to GLP provides a lot of information to the process, which definitely included various checks and balances.
The government acknowledges that mistakes will likely have been made during the process, given the haste which was needed and the fact that central government is not normally involved directly in NHS PPE procurement, adding to the complications that some NHS trusts procure individually and some through NHSSC and other conglomerates.
None of this adds up to corruption, which is a very serious, libelous accusation.
I stand by my accusation
I am sure the government can sue me if they wish
You realize you are also accusing various companies of corruption, as well as the government?
This would amount to libel of not proved.
Given you stand by your accusations, I assume you have no problems with anyone highlighting them to the relevant parties involved?
They are on Twitter
But let me be clearer – and read what I said – which emphasised that I had not checked these individual cases – where I had relied on quoted sources
WHat I was saying was that the government was not following its procedures
Your assumption that this means the companies were not is wrong – and you should know that
The title of this blog is “I can accuse the government of being corrupt without fear now, because the evidence supports my case. And that’s profoundly worrying.”
From this statement I assume you mean that the government is corrupt, and you have evidence to prove this.
Now you are saying that they are just not following procedures, and you haven’t checked any sources and are relying on twitter.
Not following procedures is VERY different to corruption. Reading something on twitter means you actually have no evidence whatsoever to support your accusation of corruption. Had you checked those sources, you would have found those sources make no allegations of corruption. You have made those allegations.
Corruption requires two parties working in tandem. In this case, government and the companies involved. So you are accusing both of corruption in this post, and any reader would assume as much.
Accusing someone, be it an individual, a company or government of corruption is accusing them of a crime. Doing so falsely, which I suggest is what you are doing given you have no evidence to secure your claims, would amount to libel.
First, I am accusing the government alone of being corrupt
Second, I simply offered some examples of cases where it was clear that the government has not followed requirements. There is, for example, a ruling against the government to publish contracts in many cases like this where it has not done so to date , wilfully And despite a legal requirement to do so. That is corrupt. That is indicative of my suggestion
But your claim that the counter party is as a result necessarily involved is absurd and I did not say so. To offer a simple example. If I pay a person in good faith for services supplied and they do not declare the sum received for tax then that is a corrupt act on their part. It does not mean I am a party to it in any way. The reciprocity you suggest required is not true, and I did not make that claim in any way.
My suggestion was abundantly clear and only related to the actions of the government.
I have accused the government.
I have not accused anyone else.
And I have certainly not libelled a named person in any way, nor have I intention of doing so. If third parties accepted these contracts they are entitled to presume the government has acted in good faith. We can ask otherwise of the government. But it does not suggest impropriety by anyone else.
Your claims are themselves wrong, I suggest, then.
I’m afraid what you think you are doing and what you are doing are not the same in precise legal terms. Corruption as set out by UK law is very specific.
The government not publishing contract details does not in itself mean corruption – not least as the government are publishing details of all contracts, just not at the pace the Good Law Project would like. This is even more ridiculous given the GLP are getting the information for their cases…from the government’s published details of said contracts. Neither they nor you actually have any evidence of corruption – though the GLP are wise enough not to even make such a claim.
The insinuation in the Twitter feed, which you then uprate to a straight accusation, is that certain companies have only won contracts because of their ties to government, and have done so in a corrupt manner. This means you are not only accusing government (wrongly) of corruption, but also accusing those businesses of it as well. In this manner, you have accused the businesses in the Twitter links you posted of corruption.
You should also note that libel law doesn’t require you to name specific individuals. You are making accusations which could potentially damage the reputations of particular companies, and are doing so without any evidence. You are also disseminating these accusations to a wide audience in a permanent medium.
At best what you have done is foolhardly and unprofessional. You have make accusations which you have not researched, having just scanned them on twitter, and clearly don’t understand the nature of what corruption actually constitutes. At worst, what you have said is libelous.
I note your intention
I have no idea who you are
I do know what corruption is
I have nit suggested fraud, which is something different
I have not in any way alleged action by companies that is corrupt
I have alleged that this government is corrupt
I have given an example, where it is clear that accepted standards of conduct have not been followed i.e, they have been corrupted
The same was true with the illegal proroguing of parliament
And of course with regard to the intent to breach international law and the Northern Ireland protocol
Both breach normal standards of conduct
They corrupt what is the accepted norm
Perhaps you do not understand what the term corrupt means?
You seem to think it is fraud. I did not say that.
And I reiterate, you think it requires reciprocity. It clearly does not.
I think you are wasting time with your misunderstanding, but let me offer further example. It is common to describe computer data as corrupted. That does not suggest it is fraudulent. It means it does not function as expected. Nor does our government now function as expected. That is the manner in which I used the term. I think that entirely acceptable. When the former President of the Supreme Court has suggested such a thing (I posted the link today as evidence of my train of thought) I hardly think the suggestion surprising.
You seem to be trying to create a different definition of corruption. It is very clear that you are not a lawyer, let’s put it that way.
“Both breach normal standards of conduct”
“They corrupt what is the accepted norm”
Neither of these statements actually have anything to do with the legal definition and common understanding of corruption. After all, in one of your other posts just today you suggest that it is acceptable to breach certain normal standards of conduct, and the government could argue exactly the same given the current situation and it’s urgency. It is quite ridiculous to try and equate saying a government is corrupt to a corrupt hard drive. The word has different meanings in the respective contexts, and people understand clearly the implications of the phrase.
The legal definition of corruption has a very specific meaning:
http://www.lawcom.gov.uk/app/uploads/2015/04/c145-Corruption.pdf
You will notice that legally corruption requires three parties, of which two are engaged in a criminal act. I never mentioned fraud – I am not sure where you pulled that from, but fraud is a crime of theft or loss, corruption is a crime of dishonesty, and they are legally distinct.
By accusing government of corruption without evidence, you are also most definitely accusing those companies they do business with of corruption. You also have no evidence for any sort of corruption – and can only call it that by broadening your definition so wide that it could encompass almost anything.
I certainly would not want to be defending your case against libel. You have accused the government of corruption, saying the deals they have done are corrupt, and the companies they have done business with have only got the business because of government connections. The insinuation any common person would take would be that those companies are also in that case corrupt. Given you don’t have evidence for this, this would amount to libel.
I notice that you are furiously backpedaling from this, saying you are not claiming these companies are corrupt, but libel relies only on the accusation and damage to reputation – the insinuation is enough. I assume you are doing this knowing the government is unlikely to bother with someone like you, but a company may well do so – it seems you have prior experience of this.
In time I expect we will find out. The Good Law Project – which is a partisan operation and not really about good law (certainly not given the number of cases they seem to lose) will eventually either win or lose their case, most likely lose. Not that they are stupid enough to accuse the government of corruption. Maybe one of the companies that you have written about will knock on your door as well – at which point you will also get to test your hypothesis regarding the nature of your accusations and how correct you are about them.
I am not backpedalling from anything
I struggled to work out what the heck you were talking about – including how you thought I was talking about companies who had no part in what I was suggeting
Your claims are simply without foundation and your legalistic approach clearly denies a widespread use of the term corruption, which I have explained and which is, for example, widely implicit in the world illicit regularly used in the tax debate of which I am a participant
You are making up a claim that simply does not exist
There is no libel
There is political-economic commentary
Now stop wasting my time, because you’re also wasting your own
What you are saying is pure nonsense.
One the one hand, you are trying to claim that the word corruption when used in this context has multiple meanings below that of the actual meaning. On the other you say you aren’t accusing the companies involved of corruption.
Yet the insinuation is there, and libel only requires the publication you have made be unfairly damaging to the parties involved.
Now, given some of the other comments on this blog, we can see exactly what your words have done to damage unfairly damage reputations and thus constitute libel.
For example:
“These companies exist solely to facilitate the people awarded the contract (almost exclusively Tory donors) acting as middlemen”
Or
“We are not going direct to manufacturers, instead handing contracts to middlemen for the sole purpose of the extracting large amounts of money from the deal.”
That is some people’s suggestion, not mine. But if people are asking such questions – and it is very clear that people are – just see the articles on this issue and comments in them – then my point that questions need answers is wholly appropriate if confidence in the probity of government and the use of public funds is to be maintained. That does not in my view mean the companies in question did anything wrong: they were offered and took contracts, but there is asymmetry in the standard required: government works to different arrangements which is why it was in IOU’s my comment could only be ditected at it
I think you will fund this is the reason why Her Majesty’s Opposition are seeking answers on this issue, this week I believe
Are you saying that debating such issues is incorrect when it is only government action that is being disputed by me, very clearly? Why?
I said answers are needed. They are, to make sure these things cannot happen if they should not. What is wrong in asking that appropriate checks and balances be required? How else might the alarm be raised if cases needing answers are not referred to, which is all I did?
But my point is clear – there are questions needing answers, from the government
Are you saying that to ask for explanation of expenditure by the government when normal protections have been suspended (I.e. they have malfunctioned or been corrupted) is wrong?
That’s what I did? Why shouldn’t I do so?
You really are making very strange claims that do not stack in any way, including ignoring totally appropriate uses of the English language in a political / economic / normal discourse context
This is what happens when people lose faith in politics. They then need a substitute
They simply give up being concerned about it because for too long the Left and Right in this country have been almost indivisible (thanks Tony).
The only way out is trying MMT and turning the current idea that we are in debt into the concept that it is investment. Whichever party does that will mean a sea-change in British politics. That is the radicalism that we need.
So, the Farage’s and BREXIT bunch creep into the vacuum and the internet also helps to get people believing in any old guff such as 5G radiation, a flat earth or doing their tweets.
I quite agree that there is something corrupt going on here – in plain sight – because people are just distracted all of the time (keeping up with our so-called Covid ‘management’ does not help either).
After all, the only alternative is to give the public services this money, which would no doubt make them perform better and then make them harder to get rid of in the eyes of the public.
Now, Boris and Co wouldn’t want that would they?
And this in Scotland –
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/10/lord-advocate-launches-war-on-twitter/?fbclid=IwAR1vIwoCkGfGd8F6tLuvkvuzM8Lxj8Pq8Jdhq6THbhDETFA3arLyPPAN2xk
Your comment, Richard, regarding a moment to enjoy speaking truth to power might well certainly be limited if the Lord Advocate should be successful.
Indeed
Apologies if this is cited in the video – I haven’t watched it yet but the Good Law Project is attempting to take the Government to court in respect of the manner in which these contracts have been awarded. I provide the link to the papers should anyone be sufficiently interested to peruse them.
I’m glad there are some in the legal system who are shouting up and taking action. They have my support.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fBQEpx5VK09woeYa9hL4xyo6a7G4C1Cg/view
It is not in the video
And where is the opposition? And why is this not on the front page of every British newspaper?
The answer might probably be found by reflecting upon the identities of the owners of the British newspapers. Just as going to a third party for your education risks your only learning what someone else wants you to know and not necessarily what it’s in your best interests to know, getting your information from one small clique of providers means you only ever learn what they want to tell you. We need more and better news sources, one reason I welcome the presence of The Canary, Byline Times etc as despite howls of Leftie from the MSM they do provide very welcome alternative perspectives.
Don’t forget the Tory Tower Hamlets housing scam where a minister (still in post) facilitated a £40 million tax dodge for a Conservative Party donor of £10,000 at a fund raising dinner.
There are literally billions of pounds of PPE contracts which have been handed to companies created only a few weeks prior to the awarding of the contracts (which were not subject to any competitive tender). These companies exist solely to facilitate the people awarded the contract (almost exclusively Tory donors) acting as middlemen, and all they actually do for millions of guaranteed profit is phone around a few of the actual PPE manufacturers (many of which have reported having been given the cold shoulder by the government).
Where are the media on this? There is no explanation for a PPE contract for tens of millions of pounds being gifted to people with zero relevant experience, other than crass cronyism. In fact, it is worse than that, because we are paying many times more than needed for PPE because
1. Contracts are not subject to any competitive tender
2. We are not going direct to manufacturers, instead handing contracts to middlemen for the sole purpose of the extracting large amounts of money from the deal.
I’ve said it before, this kind of blatant and reckless corruption, is akin to raiding the stationery cupboard when you hear the company you work for is going into liquidation. I would suggest those involved know a very ill wind is on the way, and their instinct is to steal, as much as they can, as quickly as they can.
The government needs to account for how this has happened
When every measure put in place to prevent corruption appears to have been ignored in these processes – most especially by omitting any form of competitive tender when there have been many stories of those who wished to tender being ignored – suggests a departure from more than due process
I ma not alleging the companies have done anything wrong
I am saying the government has
To Andrew above, who seems to blanch at the thought of government malfeasance, can I just remind him that during the election their official Twitter account was rebranded ‘factcheckuk’ before churning out a stream of verifiably false statements. Please stop with your prim apologist behaviour for these criminals, it’s embarrassing.
For the sake of accuracy, it was the Conservative Party that rebranded its Twitter account during the election.
I am content in calling this government corrupt. I have said much worse on test and trace where I feel the government are being criminally negligent.
Now having watched the IBA webinar (link posted previously by Richard) it seems to me that those notable QCs are in agreement that the Internal Market Bill seeks to place the Government above the law. If they are concerned about that then I think I should be too and I am.
The way this Government, and its ministers, has/have acted to date signals what is to come and I would speculate this – ever-increasing acts of near, or actual, illegality. It’s a sad irony that ‘due process’ is being used to overturn, and remain untouchable for the abandonment of, due process.
Total power and control of the UK’s constituent countries residing with Westminster and in Scotland’s particular case, destroying the Act of Union. Roll on the fight for independence of each and every one. How are we, in England, to be free of this?
“Litigious” Andrew above – you seem to avoid judgement on the morality of what this government do, not only in the Covid arena, but also for example in ministers selecting their own marginal or recently won constituencies to benefit from public funds. On Marr last Sunday, Robert Jenrick conceded that his constituency, Newark, never made the top 100 in the Town Fund but were given £25m, his fellow minister having decided to push them up the ladder while he did the same for him and his constituency. Pork barrel politics is corruption as people understand it and it drives a coach and horse through the Nolan principles designed to avoid even the perception of wrongdoing, let alone the reality of it. Yet you have nothing to say about it. Why is that?