Corbyn's Labour
After all that happened at Westminster during the great MPs' expenses scandal I am astounded that Jeremy Corbyn's 'enforcer' in the House of Lords, Steve Bassam, was allowed to resign instead of being run out of town in disgrace.
The 'noble' lord claimed £260,000 in accommodation expenses even though he traveled up and down to London from his home in Brighton every day.
To add insult to injury the Labour peer also charged the taxpayer a further £41,000 in train and taxi fares, although worst of all was his claim 'not to have broken any rules'.
Read the full story via the link below to The Independent.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/lord-bassam-resigns-labour-chief-whip-expenses-latest-a8096131.html
Lord Bassam resigns: Labour's Lords chief whip stands down after expenses row
Lord Bassam expected to leave post early in 2018
By Ben Kentish - The Independent
Lord Bassam told colleagues he would step down once a successor had been chosen PA
Labour's Chief Whip in the House of Lords has said he will resign amid controversy over his expenses claims.
Lord Bassam has told fellow peers that he plans to step down from his role early in 2018, after a replacement has been elected, The Independent understands.
His resignation comes days after it was revealed that he had agreed to repay £41,000 in expenses after admitting he had been wrong to claim them
The peer, who lives in Brighton, had claimed £260,000 over seven years to cover the cost of accommodation in London.
However, he did not stay in London but commuted each day from Brighton, claiming a further £41,000 in the same period to cover the cost of train and taxi fares.
A Labour source told The Independent: "Steve has told fellow members of the Labour Lords group he plans to step down from his role as Opposition Chief Whip early in 2018 once a replacement has been elected by our Peers.
The BBC reports on the hate-filled remarks of Labour MP Jared O'Mara which have forced his resignation from the House Commons Women and Equalities Committee.
Before becoming an MP in June 2017 at the age of 36 Jared received a first class honours degree in journalism and was a local school governor as well as volunteering for Sheffield-based charities.
So Jared's not exactly led a particularly sheltered or difficult life and his explanation that these comments were made as a young man (of 23) have a very hollow ring, if you ask me.
I'll bet you a pound to a penny that Jared's a big champion of equal pay and as a Jeremy Corbyn supporter no doubt he wears his left-wing heart on his sleeve, even though Jared's unguarded words tell a very different story.
The fact that this clown unseated the former Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg tells you a lot about the state of politics today in Sheffield Hallam.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-41724540
MP Jared O'Mara quits equalities committee over homophobic remarks
BBC - Sheffield & South Yorkshire
'Horrendous and vile'
The posts were first reported by the Guido Fawkes website, which has since revealed that two years earlier Mr O'Mara made homophobic remarks on an internet forum.
The MP has also apologised for these comments and said he was "deeply ashamed" of his actions.
The Labour leadership described Mr O'Mara's online remarks as "horrendous" and "vile" but sources said he would not be suspended from the parliamentary party, BBC political correspondent Chris Mason reported.
Mr Mason said he understood Mr O'Mara addressed his colleagues at a meeting of Labour MPs and made "a full and very personal apology" for his remarks.
Lib Dem peer Lord Scriven, former leader of Sheffield Council, said: "It seems like a nasty pattern of sexist language and misogyny is developing from the Labour MP for Sheffield Hallam.
"He clearly isn't fit to sit on the Women and Equalities Committee. He must stand down from that committee immediately and if he doesn't, Jeremy Corbyn must take action to remove him."
Stella Creasy, Labour MP for Walthamstow, added she had asked for a meeting with Mr O'Mara to discuss his comments.
Labour's Chief Whip in the House of Lords has said he will resign amid controversy over his expenses claims.
Lord Bassam has told fellow peers that he plans to step down from his role early in 2018, after a replacement has been elected, The Independent understands.
His resignation comes days after it was revealed that he had agreed to repay £41,000 in expenses after admitting he had been wrong to claim them
The peer, who lives in Brighton, had claimed £260,000 over seven years to cover the cost of accommodation in London.
However, he did not stay in London but commuted each day from Brighton, claiming a further £41,000 in the same period to cover the cost of train and taxi fares.
A Labour source told The Independent: "Steve has told fellow members of the Labour Lords group he plans to step down from his role as Opposition Chief Whip early in 2018 once a replacement has been elected by our Peers.
Corbyn's Labour (24/10/17)
The BBC reports on the hate-filled remarks of Labour MP Jared O'Mara which have forced his resignation from the House Commons Women and Equalities Committee.
Before becoming an MP in June 2017 at the age of 36 Jared received a first class honours degree in journalism and was a local school governor as well as volunteering for Sheffield-based charities.
So Jared's not exactly led a particularly sheltered or difficult life and his explanation that these comments were made as a young man (of 23) have a very hollow ring, if you ask me.
I'll bet you a pound to a penny that Jared's a big champion of equal pay and as a Jeremy Corbyn supporter no doubt he wears his left-wing heart on his sleeve, even though Jared's unguarded words tell a very different story.
The fact that this clown unseated the former Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg tells you a lot about the state of politics today in Sheffield Hallam.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-41724540
MP Jared O'Mara quits equalities committee over homophobic remarks
BBC - Sheffield & South Yorkshire
Image copyright - HOUSE OF COMMONS
Labour MP Jared O'Mara has quit the Commons equality committee over online homophobic comments he made before being elected to parliament.
Mr O'Mara also made misogynistic remarks, joked about having an orgy with members of Girls Aloud and posted degrading comments about fat people.
The Sheffield Hallam MP, 36, was elected in June, unseating ex-deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.
Mr O'Mara resigned from the Women and Equalities Committee after apologising.
In posts made on the Drowned in Sound music website in 2004, Mr O'Mara claimed singer Michelle McManus only won Pop Idol "because she was fat" and said it would be funny if jazz star Jamie Cullum was "sodomised with his own piano".
Labour MP Jared O'Mara has quit the Commons equality committee over online homophobic comments he made before being elected to parliament.
Mr O'Mara also made misogynistic remarks, joked about having an orgy with members of Girls Aloud and posted degrading comments about fat people.
The Sheffield Hallam MP, 36, was elected in June, unseating ex-deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.
Mr O'Mara resigned from the Women and Equalities Committee after apologising.
In posts made on the Drowned in Sound music website in 2004, Mr O'Mara claimed singer Michelle McManus only won Pop Idol "because she was fat" and said it would be funny if jazz star Jamie Cullum was "sodomised with his own piano".
'Horrendous and vile'
The posts were first reported by the Guido Fawkes website, which has since revealed that two years earlier Mr O'Mara made homophobic remarks on an internet forum.
The MP has also apologised for these comments and said he was "deeply ashamed" of his actions.
The Labour leadership described Mr O'Mara's online remarks as "horrendous" and "vile" but sources said he would not be suspended from the parliamentary party, BBC political correspondent Chris Mason reported.
Mr Mason said he understood Mr O'Mara addressed his colleagues at a meeting of Labour MPs and made "a full and very personal apology" for his remarks.
Lib Dem peer Lord Scriven, former leader of Sheffield Council, said: "It seems like a nasty pattern of sexist language and misogyny is developing from the Labour MP for Sheffield Hallam.
"He clearly isn't fit to sit on the Women and Equalities Committee. He must stand down from that committee immediately and if he doesn't, Jeremy Corbyn must take action to remove him."
Stella Creasy, Labour MP for Walthamstow, added she had asked for a meeting with Mr O'Mara to discuss his comments.
'Change their views'
However Wes Streeting, Labour MP for Ilford North, who was at the meeting earlier, said: "He offered what seemed to be a heartfelt and genuine apology and admitted that these are views he once held, which took guts.
"The battle for equality is a battle for hearts and minds and that must surely mean that people are allowed to change their views and therefore must also be offered a second chance.
"I hope I don't end up eating my words and that he demonstrates his commitment to equality as a new MP. I think we owe him that chance."
However Wes Streeting, Labour MP for Ilford North, who was at the meeting earlier, said: "He offered what seemed to be a heartfelt and genuine apology and admitted that these are views he once held, which took guts.
"The battle for equality is a battle for hearts and minds and that must surely mean that people are allowed to change their views and therefore must also be offered a second chance.
"I hope I don't end up eating my words and that he demonstrates his commitment to equality as a new MP. I think we owe him that chance."
Image copyright - PA Image caption - Girls Aloud were the subject of one of Mr O'Mara's online comments
In a statement, Mr O'Mara said he had been "wrong to make" the comments.
"I understand why they are offensive and deeply apologise for my use of such unacceptable language."
"I made the comments as a young man, at a particularly difficult time in my life, but that is no excuse."
Before his resignation from the committee, LGBT Labour said: "Whilst we recognise that these comments were made some time ago, that doesn't excuse such ignorance and bigotry.
"We expect a full and public apology from Mr O'Mara and ask that he meets with members of the LGBT Labour committee in order to understand the inequality many LGBT people face."
"Since when was trade unionism about filling your boots at the members' expense?" - seems like the obvious question to ask in light of this damning BBC report into the activities of Labour MP Ian Lavery, a high-profile member of Jeremy Corbyn's shadow cabinet.
Now the NUM Northumberland Area has not been a trade union, in the normal sense, for many years because most, if not all, of its members are long retired and so did not require the usual kind of trade union support or representation at the workplace.
Yet its grandly named 'General Secretary' apparently received a salary worth tens of thousands of pounds for a period 18 years and also had the gall to accept a £72,500 redundancy payment, even though Mr Lavery left his employment voluntarily to take up another well paid job at Westminster as a Labour MP.
The whole business stinks to high heaven if you ask me, which the Labour leader must realise as a former trade union official himself.
The affair also has echoes of the £400,000 'loan' provided to the Unite boss Len McCluskey in order to help buy a swish new apartment in central London, even though McCluskey (67) had been living and working in London for 26 years.
No one can reasonably defend using members' money in this way.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41688280
Ian Lavery MP received £165,000 from trade union
By John Sweeney and Ed Brown - BBC Newsnight
Media caption - Newsnight's John Sweeney confronts Labour MP Ian Lavery
The answer, it turns out, is no. He didn't pay off his mortgage. The union of which he was general secretary for 18 years, the NUM Northumberland Area, paid it off and paid him much more besides.
Last year, both Jeremy Corbyn and the parliamentary watchdog cleared Mr Lavery. He denies any wrongdoing.
The reason we know more about Mr Lavery's peculiar mortgage arrangements is because the trade union regulator, the Certification Officer, Gerard Walker, examined the books after investigations by BBC Newsnight and the Sunday Times. Mr Lavery ran the NUM Northumberland Area for 18 years until he stepped down in 2010 to become the MP for Wansbeck.
The regulator's findings are available online.
The regulator found that that the Northumberland Provident and Benevolent fund had lent Mr Lavery £72,500 to buy a house in 1994. 13 years on, the union Mr Lavery was then running forgave the loan to Mr Lavery. So he was £72,500 the richer.
But there's more. He'd been paying into an endowment fund to pay back the capital cost of the house. It had underperformed, but it still paid out £18,000. The regulator found Mr Lavery kept that too.
And that's not all.
The regulator found that in 2005, Mr Lavery sold a 15% stake in his house to the Union for £36,000. In 2013 the house was worth less, so he bought it back from the union for £27,500 - a notional profit of £8,500.
And then there's Mr Lavery's "termination payments", totalling £89,887.83. However, that total is a matter of some dispute between him and the union.
The regulator says that neither Mr Lavery nor the union could provide documentary evidence of the process or the decision by which Mr Lavery was made redundant - or why, given he was leaving for a job as an MP, he needed any redundancy payments at all.
Adding £89,887 he received for his undocumented redundancy package to the £72,500 for the forgiven house loan to the £18,000 he was gifted from his endowment, that totals £180,387.
But, then, it seems Mr Lavery and his old union fell out. The union recently realised it had overpaid Mr Lavery's redundancy by £30,600. The regulator's report shows that the union asked for it back. Mr Lavery disputed £10,600 of it - and said he'd only give them £15,000. When the regulator asked the union why they settled for this, they simply replied that they were mindful of Mr Lavery disputing it and the potential legal costs:
"Mr. Lavery was adamant that £15,000 was his final offer, we were left with little choice but to accept."
So our running total of dosh from the union to its one-time general secretary is reduced by £15,000 to £165,387. That's a bob or two in anyone's language.
A year ago, when we started questioning Mr Lavery on this matter, Jeremy Corbyn gave him the benefit of the doubt and the Parliamentary commissioner cleared him of wrongdoing, which he has always denied. Since then, Mr Lavery has risen in Labour's ranks to be one of the Labour leader's closest and most trusted lieutenants.
Image copyright - GETTY IMAGES
Now that we know just how much money he got from the trade union he used to run, it's fair to ask whether this man is a fit and proper person to be chairman of the Labour Party.
Ian Lavery told BBC Newsnight in a statement tonight:
"Under my stewardship, the union always complied with the rules and the Certification Officer signed off every year's transactions. As the Certification Officer's report makes clear, no member of the union, past or present, has made a complaint about the financial affairs of the union. I am pleased that the Certification Officer has decided to not appoint an inspector or take further action.
"This report should draw a line under almost two years of allegations and innuendo directed at me and my former colleagues. Our legacy is helping miners and their families when others abandoned them, bringing millions of pounds of compensation into the Northumberland Coalfield. I remain immensely proud of our record."
I listened to Ian Lavery (Labour's elections coordinator) deliver a 'warm-up' speech ahead of Jeremy Corbyn appearing on stage to launch the Labour Party's election manifesto.
Now I don't know Mr Lavery, but he sounded like a poor man's Arthur Scargill to me full of angry and windy rhetoric about the great sacrifices made by previous generations of Labour supporters.
I've heard this kind of 'standing on the shoulders of giants' speech more times than I care to remember, but Ian Lavery brings a whole new meaning to this slogan when you consider the circumstances under which he left his job at the NUM (National Union of Mineworkers).
If you ask me, someone who leaves their job to become a well paid Member of Parliament is not entitled to a redundancy payment because they are resigning from their post voluntarily - so why do they need or deserve a huge sum of NUM members' money.
Yet one one Jeremy Corbyn's key supporters thought it was OK to accept a £140,000 payment from a largely defunct union with very few active members given the decline of the mining industry.
Ian Lavery is a big Jeremy Corbyn supporter who was promoted to the role of election coordinator recently after yet another shadow cabinet reshuffle that was forced upon the Labour leader because the vast majority of MPs have no confidence in him.
The standards watchdog at Westminster has required Ian Lavery to apologise to the House of Commons over his failure to disclose benefits from his previous employment as general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) for the Northumberland area from 1992 until 2010.
But the real story is that Ian Lavery received £140,000 in redundancy payments even though he resigned from this job to take up a more lucrative position as a Labour MP.
On top of that Ian Lavery received a cheap mortgage from the NUM which by that time had a tiny membership and even more incredibly this subsidised mortgage was mysteriously written off.
Read the reports below from the Politics Home web site and the BBC, but if you ask me there are remarkable similarities between Ian Lavery and Len McLuskey, another big Corbyn fan who regards himself as a left-wing socialist.
In a statement, Mr O'Mara said he had been "wrong to make" the comments.
"I understand why they are offensive and deeply apologise for my use of such unacceptable language."
"I made the comments as a young man, at a particularly difficult time in my life, but that is no excuse."
Before his resignation from the committee, LGBT Labour said: "Whilst we recognise that these comments were made some time ago, that doesn't excuse such ignorance and bigotry.
"We expect a full and public apology from Mr O'Mara and ask that he meets with members of the LGBT Labour committee in order to understand the inequality many LGBT people face."
Cronyism vs Trade Unionism (22/10/17)
"Since when was trade unionism about filling your boots at the members' expense?" - seems like the obvious question to ask in light of this damning BBC report into the activities of Labour MP Ian Lavery, a high-profile member of Jeremy Corbyn's shadow cabinet.
Now the NUM Northumberland Area has not been a trade union, in the normal sense, for many years because most, if not all, of its members are long retired and so did not require the usual kind of trade union support or representation at the workplace.
Yet its grandly named 'General Secretary' apparently received a salary worth tens of thousands of pounds for a period 18 years and also had the gall to accept a £72,500 redundancy payment, even though Mr Lavery left his employment voluntarily to take up another well paid job at Westminster as a Labour MP.
The whole business stinks to high heaven if you ask me, which the Labour leader must realise as a former trade union official himself.
The affair also has echoes of the £400,000 'loan' provided to the Unite boss Len McCluskey in order to help buy a swish new apartment in central London, even though McCluskey (67) had been living and working in London for 26 years.
No one can reasonably defend using members' money in this way.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41688280
Ian Lavery MP received £165,000 from trade union
By John Sweeney and Ed Brown - BBC Newsnight
Image copyright - SHUTTERSTOCK
MP Ian Lavery received £165,000 from the 10-member trade union he ran.
We have learned this from the trade union regulator which has now released a report into Mr Lavery's actions as general secretary of the NUM Northumberland Area.
He will now face questions on his record over a number of disputed payments by the union he ran.
Mr Lavery, who is the chairman of the Labour Party, denies any wrongdoing.
Ian Lavery is a coming power in the land, Jeremy Corbyn's general election joint co-ordinator and chairman of the Labour Party. If the Conservatives fall, he's most likely destined for high office. But, perhaps, for one thing: his refusal to answer a simple question asked by BBC Newsnight last year: "Did you pay off the mortgage?" BBC Newsnight asked him nine times without getting a reply.
MP Ian Lavery received £165,000 from the 10-member trade union he ran.
We have learned this from the trade union regulator which has now released a report into Mr Lavery's actions as general secretary of the NUM Northumberland Area.
He will now face questions on his record over a number of disputed payments by the union he ran.
Mr Lavery, who is the chairman of the Labour Party, denies any wrongdoing.
Ian Lavery is a coming power in the land, Jeremy Corbyn's general election joint co-ordinator and chairman of the Labour Party. If the Conservatives fall, he's most likely destined for high office. But, perhaps, for one thing: his refusal to answer a simple question asked by BBC Newsnight last year: "Did you pay off the mortgage?" BBC Newsnight asked him nine times without getting a reply.
Media caption - Newsnight's John Sweeney confronts Labour MP Ian Lavery
The answer, it turns out, is no. He didn't pay off his mortgage. The union of which he was general secretary for 18 years, the NUM Northumberland Area, paid it off and paid him much more besides.
Last year, both Jeremy Corbyn and the parliamentary watchdog cleared Mr Lavery. He denies any wrongdoing.
The reason we know more about Mr Lavery's peculiar mortgage arrangements is because the trade union regulator, the Certification Officer, Gerard Walker, examined the books after investigations by BBC Newsnight and the Sunday Times. Mr Lavery ran the NUM Northumberland Area for 18 years until he stepped down in 2010 to become the MP for Wansbeck.
The regulator's findings are available online.
The regulator found that that the Northumberland Provident and Benevolent fund had lent Mr Lavery £72,500 to buy a house in 1994. 13 years on, the union Mr Lavery was then running forgave the loan to Mr Lavery. So he was £72,500 the richer.
But there's more. He'd been paying into an endowment fund to pay back the capital cost of the house. It had underperformed, but it still paid out £18,000. The regulator found Mr Lavery kept that too.
And that's not all.
The regulator found that in 2005, Mr Lavery sold a 15% stake in his house to the Union for £36,000. In 2013 the house was worth less, so he bought it back from the union for £27,500 - a notional profit of £8,500.
And then there's Mr Lavery's "termination payments", totalling £89,887.83. However, that total is a matter of some dispute between him and the union.
The regulator says that neither Mr Lavery nor the union could provide documentary evidence of the process or the decision by which Mr Lavery was made redundant - or why, given he was leaving for a job as an MP, he needed any redundancy payments at all.
Adding £89,887 he received for his undocumented redundancy package to the £72,500 for the forgiven house loan to the £18,000 he was gifted from his endowment, that totals £180,387.
But, then, it seems Mr Lavery and his old union fell out. The union recently realised it had overpaid Mr Lavery's redundancy by £30,600. The regulator's report shows that the union asked for it back. Mr Lavery disputed £10,600 of it - and said he'd only give them £15,000. When the regulator asked the union why they settled for this, they simply replied that they were mindful of Mr Lavery disputing it and the potential legal costs:
"Mr. Lavery was adamant that £15,000 was his final offer, we were left with little choice but to accept."
So our running total of dosh from the union to its one-time general secretary is reduced by £15,000 to £165,387. That's a bob or two in anyone's language.
A year ago, when we started questioning Mr Lavery on this matter, Jeremy Corbyn gave him the benefit of the doubt and the Parliamentary commissioner cleared him of wrongdoing, which he has always denied. Since then, Mr Lavery has risen in Labour's ranks to be one of the Labour leader's closest and most trusted lieutenants.
Image copyright - GETTY IMAGES
Now that we know just how much money he got from the trade union he used to run, it's fair to ask whether this man is a fit and proper person to be chairman of the Labour Party.
Ian Lavery told BBC Newsnight in a statement tonight:
"Under my stewardship, the union always complied with the rules and the Certification Officer signed off every year's transactions. As the Certification Officer's report makes clear, no member of the union, past or present, has made a complaint about the financial affairs of the union. I am pleased that the Certification Officer has decided to not appoint an inspector or take further action.
"This report should draw a line under almost two years of allegations and innuendo directed at me and my former colleagues. Our legacy is helping miners and their families when others abandoned them, bringing millions of pounds of compensation into the Northumberland Coalfield. I remain immensely proud of our record."
Team Corbyn (10/05/17)
I listened to Ian Lavery (Labour's elections coordinator) deliver a 'warm-up' speech ahead of Jeremy Corbyn appearing on stage to launch the Labour Party's election manifesto.
Now I don't know Mr Lavery, but he sounded like a poor man's Arthur Scargill to me full of angry and windy rhetoric about the great sacrifices made by previous generations of Labour supporters.
I've heard this kind of 'standing on the shoulders of giants' speech more times than I care to remember, but Ian Lavery brings a whole new meaning to this slogan when you consider the circumstances under which he left his job at the NUM (National Union of Mineworkers).
If you ask me, someone who leaves their job to become a well paid Member of Parliament is not entitled to a redundancy payment because they are resigning from their post voluntarily - so why do they need or deserve a huge sum of NUM members' money.
Yet one one Jeremy Corbyn's key supporters thought it was OK to accept a £140,000 payment from a largely defunct union with very few active members given the decline of the mining industry.
Team Corbyn (18/03/17)
Ian Lavery is a big Jeremy Corbyn supporter who was promoted to the role of election coordinator recently after yet another shadow cabinet reshuffle that was forced upon the Labour leader because the vast majority of MPs have no confidence in him.
The standards watchdog at Westminster has required Ian Lavery to apologise to the House of Commons over his failure to disclose benefits from his previous employment as general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) for the Northumberland area from 1992 until 2010.
But the real story is that Ian Lavery received £140,000 in redundancy payments even though he resigned from this job to take up a more lucrative position as a Labour MP.
On top of that Ian Lavery received a cheap mortgage from the NUM which by that time had a tiny membership and even more incredibly this subsidised mortgage was mysteriously written off.
Read the reports below from the Politics Home web site and the BBC, but if you ask me there are remarkable similarities between Ian Lavery and Len McLuskey, another big Corbyn fan who regards himself as a left-wing socialist.
