Donorgate Duckshoot

Abrahams lines up ten.

I don’t have a lot of time for much else today, but Gordon Brown cannot be happy with the headlines this morning, according to the Sunday Times, David Abrahams is claiming that ten top brass in the Labour Party were aware of his “methods” of making donations, and the Mail on Sunday has found another target to aim at as they claim that Labour’s second biggest donor is not even entitled to vote at general elections! Mahmoud Khayami, a French citizen, has given a total of £830,000 in the past eight months, his first donation of £500,000 was made just 24 hours after his name appeared on the electoral roll, he is entitled to vote in local and European elections only. This shows how close to the wind the Labour Party was sailing and confirms the suspicions that Gordon Brown was making a “dash for cash” as he dithered over the possibility of having an election.

The Sunday Telegraph connects Lord “cashpoint” Levy and Tony Blair to Abrahams , and leads with Gordon Brown’s attempts to throw a smokescreen with his pledge to clean up the financing of political parties, Chris Grayling is having none of it.  He’s just issued this statement:

“This morning’s speech is a pretty opportunistic attempt by Gordon Brown to erect a smokescreen around events of the past two days.  David Cameron wrote to him in October urging major reforms to party funding and a cap on donations, Gordon Brown refused because he didn’t want to give up on the multi-million pound financing from the trade unions.  His decision to pick up the issue again today must be more than an attempt to divert attention away from party problems.  The other real concern about this morning’s comments is that it looks like he’s trying to find ways of giving himself greater political advantage.  He wants to cut campaigning by his opponents in marginal seats whilst continuing to use tax payers’ money to give his MPs a communication allowance to spend in those same marginal seats.  It also looks as if he’s set on protecting big trade union donations whilst putting limits on everyone else.”

Even if Labour did reform the laws governing party funding, does anyone believe that they are competent or honest enough to abide by them? (From Conservative Home.)

The best newspaper assessment yet of Labour’s incompetence came yesterday from Matthew Parris in an article entitled “They can’t even cook their own books”

A tale of spivvy incompetence: a big stage, and a cast of insects. Second-rate ministers flanking a third-rate Prime Minister waited upon by fourth-rate courtiers sending out the begging bowl to fifth-rate sleeve-tuggers who aren’t even very rich. At Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday, that “Mr Bean” gibe said it all.

Read the full article here