Skip to main content

More in Anger than in Sorrow

I have known David Laws vaguely for several years. He has total integrity. He gave up a burgeoning career in finance because he had "already made enough money". For several years he worked for essentially no money to help craft a set of economically coherent policies for the Liberal Democrats. He has a forensic intelligence- a deeply impressive understanding of economic and financial context. He is a genuine star in a field where mediocrities are more usually the norm.

In the first few days of the new coalition he was already establishing himself as a key figure at the very heart of government, and was becoming not just respected but popular on both sides of the government.

David has always been intensely private about himself. Those who knew him best have generally assumed that he was gay, but if he chose not to discuss his private life then that was entirely his choice. To see the obvious personal distress that he is in as the result of the attacks against him in the press has filled me with a cold and furious contempt for those responsible.

Essentially no one can be safe from attack under the spurious label of expenses. David did not make a cent from these supposed abuses. It is incredible that such destructive cruelty can be unleashed in the name of "the public's right to know". Britain deserves better leaders: leaders with the quality of David Laws- but no one will put themselves forward in the future when any tiny mistake can become such a cause celebre: where no one in the public eye can defend themselves from a shredding at the hands of a criminally irresponsible media.

Make no mistake, what was done to David Laws was wicked.

Those responsible are evil- there is no other word for it.

It is time they were themselves held to account for their own vile hypocrisy.

UPDATE: I e-mailed a journalist friend as follows:

Following on from our discussion at lunch the other day, I must say the eventual outing of David Laws that we discussed as a possibility has really shown up the media in a truly horrid way.

I think what has been done to David is actually evil- I think the damage to our country that may come from his fall is appalling.

Those responsible- presumably the Barclay brothers- have behaved in a way that is simply monstrous. Every one of us- all of us- has something in their lives that could be read by the mind of evil doers in a bad light.

Quite frankly I hope that some one destroys the figures in the media that sponsored this with the same ferocious efficiency which has just been used to destroy the life of David Laws.

If he kills himself, they will all have blood on their hands.

Sorry- but I am absolutely incensed by this. The scandal is the media, not the minister.

Comments

Jock Coats said…
I sincerely hope you have no knowledge that leads you to believe that your antepenultimate sentence is a remote possibility?

I know, it would not be unheard of, of course, especially, perhaps, with people of his talent and brilliance, but I hope not.

#telegraphscum
Newmania said…
I was never overly concerned about the 'expenses scandal' anyway myself , hardly news that people are greedy is it . Not to me anyway. I found the sermons issued by Clegg somewhat tiresome at the time .
In this case Laws could have easily have claimed far more if he had wanted to,so it seems unlikely that cash was the objective. I am still unclear why he pretended he was renting from an un-connected person though , when he was not ? Your assertion that he made nothing is surely incorrect. He claimed , as I understand it , about £40,000 which he was not owed, by the taxpayer .He made £40,000 then ..didn`t he ?
I regard it as a technicality .I certainly agree with you that it is a dreadful day for the country .Laws immediately impressed me and his presence was crucial to the success of the coalition.

I hope you have underestimated Mr.Law`s intestinal fortitude .He had to go , I think, but his early and decisive action will enable him to rejoin the cabinet in no more than a year’s time. His replacement is ,I gather, exceedingly able


If I had to guess whose dirty tricks dept cooked this up I would look in the direction of Alistair Campbell but papers are there to sell papers and there is probably no more to it than that
lib dem bum den? said…
he'll probably send us the bill for the funeral
Cicero said…
I am sure David will be fine: but it has happened before in other circumstances. One day the media will indeed kill someone (I should say "again", because it has certainly happened before).
Here is a comment that I have already posted on a couple of blogs, one sympathetic to David Laws and one critical of him.

As well as showing my opinion of the British media - and it's strange how people who live outside the UK (I'm in Spain) see them differently from those that live there - it offers a possible explanation for why he acted as he did.

One point that is missed here, which would explain why he chose to claim less than he was entitled to in order to protect his privacy, is that in 2006 there was a change in the rules. Before that he was, presumably, declaring his payments to Landie correctly under the existing rules. After the change he should have stopped paying Landie but had he done so the sheet-sniffing reptiles of the British press would certainly have noticed, and might very well have done to him what they had done to another public figure who valued his privacy, Nigel Hawthorne, a few years earlier. Faced with the practical certainty of being outed and pilloried by the reptiles or carrying on as he was and hoping that nobody would notice, he seems to have chosen the latter course even though he lost out financially as a result.

And I do not blame him in the slightest.
Jock Coats said…
Indeed Lavergno, our local (Oxfordshire) press has for many years now done a review of the expenses claims by our six MPs and their register of interests entries and would certainly have picked up on a housing costs allowance falling to nothing if he had stopped completely.
I found the sermons issued by Clegg somewhat tiresome at the time .
In this case Laws could have easily have claimed far more if he had wanted to,so it seems unlikely that cash was the objective.

Popular posts from this blog

Concert and Blues

Tallinn is full tonight... Big concerts on at the Song field The Weeknd and Bonnie Tyler (!). The place is buzzing and some sixty thousand concert goers have booked every bed for thirty miles around Tallinn. It should be a busy high summer, but it isn´t. Tourism is down sharply overall. Only 70 cruise ships calling this season, versus over 300 before Ukraine. Since no one goes to St Pete, demand has fallen, and of course people think that Estonia is not safe. We are tired. The economy is still under big pressure, and the fall of tourism is a significant part of that. The credit rating for Estonia has been downgraded as the government struggles with spending. The summer has been a little gloomy, and soon the long and slow autumn will drift into the dark of the year. Yesterday I met with more refugees: the usual horrible stories, the usual tears. I try to make myself immune, but I can´t. These people are wounded in spirit, carrying their grief in a terrible cradling. I try to project hop...

One Year On

  Head vabariigi iseseisvuspäeva! Happy Estonian Independence Day! It is one year since I stood outside the Estonian Parliament for the traditional raising of the national flag from Tall Hermann tower. Looking at the young fraternities gathered with their flags, I was very sure that Estonia too would soon be facing the aggression of the criminal Russian regime. A tragic and dark day. 5 eyes intelligence had been clear: an all out invasion was going to happen, and Putin´s goals included- and still include- "restoration" of Russian imperial power across Europe, even to the Atlantic. Yet there was one Western intelligence failure: we all underestimated the guts of the Ukrainian armed forces, the ZSU, and its President and people. One year on, Estonia, and indeed all the front line states against Russia, knows that Ukraine saved us. Estonia used that time to prepare itself, should that "delayed" onslaught ever be unleashed, but equally the determination of Kaja Kallas, ...

A Hard Frost

  After a week of slush and damp, tonight there is a hard frost in Tallinn. The general election campaign has started with the parties submitting their lists of candidates and announcing their programs. The polls seem to show a polarization of views. Although the Liberal Reform party of PM Kaja Kallas is set to remain as the largest party in the 101 seat Riigikogu, the steady rise of the far right EKRE seems to place them firmly in second place, replacing the Social Liberal Centre Party, who seem set to lose several seats. In addition to the Conservative Isamaaliit and the Social Democrat SDE, there is a fair likelihood that a new party will join these in Parliament, namely the Business/Green minded Eesti 200. The Greens and the Libertarian "Right wingers" look like they will struggle to gain seats. A Moderate Reform/SDE/E200 coalition would be a good outcome, but the numbers will have to fall just so, otherwise there remains the chance of another Centre/Isamaa/EKRE coalition...