Moonlighting MPs
The former Labour leader and Prime Minister - Gordon Brown - seems a bit touchy these days - though goodness knows why.
The globe-trotting MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath might have a lot on his plate these days - running the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown (OOGASB) - but he still found the time to complain to the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) about an article in the Sunday Times.
The upshot is that Gordon's complaint was rejected by the PCC - though it does throw up some other interesting questions such as - 'Who exactly is Charlie King?' and who else does the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown employ?'.
In my view these charitable organisations should be very open and transparent - but there's precious little information about the workings of OOGASB on its web site - in terms of detailing the money that OOGASB raises and how these funds are spent.
Maybe the information is available from another source - if so, I must find out.
A complaint against The Sunday Times on behalf of Gordon Brown has been rejected by the Press Complaints Commission (PCC).
It arose from a news story on December 9 last year, “Globe-trotting Gordon Brown loses his voice”, which reported that the former prime minister had “not spoken in parliament for more than a year while crisscrossing the globe to maintain an international profile”.
The complaint, brought on his behalf by Charlie King, who works for the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown, focused on the story’s references to payments for non-parliamentary activities such as speech-making, which Brown had declared in the parliamentary register of financial interests.
The story said Brown had “received” more than £2m in fees and expenses since leaving office, but it made clear the money had not been used for his personal gain.
King accused The Sunday Times on Brown’s behalf of publishing a “deliberate slur”.
In his complaint to the PCC he argued that the use of the word “received” was inaccurate because the former PM did not personally receive the money. He asked for a correction and an apology.
The Sunday Times responded that no reasonable person would misunderstand the meaning of “received” in the context of the article.
In its adjudication, issued last week, the PCC said: “There was no dispute over the figures included in the article. It was for the commission to consider whether, in these circumstances, it was inaccurate or misleading for the newspaper to say that Gordon Brown had ‘received’ the payments.
“It was the commission’s view that the newspaper had not misrepresented the situation. The payments related to activities undertaken by Gordon Brown — institutions or organisations made the payments in return for his services. In such circumstances, whether Mr Brown or his office directly ‘received’ the payments did not represent a significant distinction, provided it was made clear the money was not for his personal gain.
“Indeed, the fact that Mr Brown had declared these payments on the register of members’ financial interests demonstrated that he, as an individual, could not be divorced from the payments and his office to the extent the complainant appeared to consider appropriate.
“The article had made clear repeatedly that the payments were not for the gain of Mr Brown personally — it stated that the money was ‘not for personal gain’, that it had ‘all been ploughed back into his public and charitable activities’ and that ‘each payment goes to the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown for the employment of staff to support my ongoing involvement in public life’.
“The latter quotation reflected the qualification of the payments Mr Brown had entered in the register of members’ financial interests. The commission did not agree that readers would be misled by the use of the term ‘receive’ into understanding that Mr Brown received the fees for personal gain. There was no breach of clause 1 (accuracy) of the editors’ code of practice.”
