Lord Taylor of Warwick expenses trial

Lords' expenses system 'a quirk'21 January 2011
http://news.aol.co.uk/politics-news/story/lords-expenses-system-a-quirk/1529698
Quote
Lord Taylor of Warwick is accused of making false expenses claims A former Tory peer accused of lying about his expenses believed it was a "quirk" of the House of Lords to list as his main residence a property he never stayed at, a court has heard.

Lord Taylor of Warwick is on trial for claiming travel costs between a home in Oxford and London, when he actually lived in the capital.

In practice, the expenses system works differently from the guidelines peers are given, he told the jury at London's Southwark Crown Court.

The 58-year-old said he followed the advice given to him by his colleagues, and it was commonplace for the wording of the guidelines not to be adhered to strictly.

During cross-examination he was asked by Helen Law, prosecuting, where he lived.

"I physically lived in Ealing," he replied. "It was the only place I physically lived in, yes."

The peer said that in reality, the term "main residence" was more ambiguous. He said: "There were difficulties, and I certainly wasn't the only one."

Mr Justice Saunders said: "There was ambiguity over it?"

Lord Taylor replied: "Yes. It was a quirk like many other things in the House of Lords."

Lord Taylor, of Lynwood Road, Ealing, west London, faces six allegations of false accounting on various dates between March 2006 and October 2007.
Unquote

These are the people corrupt deviants who pass laws and sit in judgement on the inhabitants of this country....When caught out they do not even have the intelligence to create a viable excuse for obtaining money by deception or fraud.

This nation needs to either rethink its mode of governance or bestow automatic titles on every criminal through the whole range.... from knife wielding, graffiti spraying hoodies to lying and corrupt prime ministers!

It is quite atonishing that his defence to ripping off the taxpayer by claiming expenses to which he was clearly not entitled appears to be "it was commonplace for the wording of the guidelines not to be adhered to strictly". If it was the done thing perhaps there should be more than a total of 5 politicians up before the beak. It is difficult to see that claiming for journeys never made can be seen as not adhering to the guidelines rather than blatant dishonesty.

It is even more astonishing that those who were supposed to be monitoring and checking expenses claims were so intimidated by MP"s and Lords that
no matter their opinions, they accepted the claims.!!!!!! Were these ever audited?

While swathing cuts are being made everywhere else, the Membership of the House of Lords is to be reduced by less than 10% Considering many of
these Peers receive awards for favours and the rest are there by inheritance I think the Lords System should be scrapped and replaced by an elected
system.

Exactly Panda, many of these so called Lords that scrabble and pick through the wealth of this nation do so purely in return for favours and donations to political parties. Many of these robed caricatures are barely able to string a sentence together in English and will turn up in the Lords only when necessary to put in their expense forms or perhaps vote on a bill that their benefactor needs to squeeze through.

Such is the respect the greedy deviants we have in parliament show to the British people who they purport to represent, that they regularly hand out titles to foreign nationals..... they'd pimp their mothers to make a penny, their fathers also...if they knew who they were.

malena stool wrote:Exactly Panda, many of these so called Lords that scrabble and pick through the wealth of this nation do so purely in return for favours and donations to political parties. Many of these robed caricatures are barely able to string a sentence together in English and will turn up in the Lords only when necessary to put in their expense forms or perhaps vote on a bill that their benefactor needs to squeeze through.

Such is the respect the greedy deviants we have in parliament show to the British people who they purport to represent, that they regularly hand out titles to foreign nationals..... they'd pimp their mothers to make a penny, their fathers also...if they knew who they were.

Yes, Malena, I agree and cannot think of one MP who would make a Good Prime Minister or one Lord who has made a difference. whatever we think of Tony Blair, it was Parliament who voted on the invasion. Sad isn"t it that the people who Govern us are so lacking in experience and democracy. Ed
Balls is a prime example, hs made a mess of the education system and now is made Chancellor!!!!!!

Panda wrote:

malena stool wrote:Exactly Panda, many of these so called Lords that scrabble and pick through the wealth of this nation do so purely in return for favours and donations to political parties. Many of these robed caricatures are barely able to string a sentence together in English and will turn up in the Lords only when necessary to put in their expense forms or perhaps vote on a bill that their benefactor needs to squeeze through.

Such is the respect the greedy deviants we have in parliament show to the British people who they purport to represent, that they regularly hand out titles to foreign nationals..... they'd pimp their mothers to make a penny, their fathers also...if they knew who they were.

Yes, Malena, I agree and cannot think of one MP who would make a Good Prime Minister or one Lord who has made a difference. whatever we think of Tony Blair, it was Parliament who voted on the invasion. Sad isn"t it that the people who Govern us are so lacking in experience and democracy. Ed
Balls is a prime example, hes made a mess of the education system and now is made Chancellor!!!!!!

He's good with figures Panda, that is all. The usual pundits speaking on BBC news when it was announced that Johnson had resigned and Balls was taking over were ecstatic, singing his praises, saying he should have had the job in the first place....one did however point out that like Blair and Brown before them, Ed Milliband and Balls did tend to clash personality wise... I have problems picturing that as they don't have a personality between them, in fact, with one or two exceptions, our representatives in parliament consider themselves to be Europeans first, rather than British. As much as I dislike her, Thatcher was the last Prime Minister who was her own person, I cannot imagine the likes of Blair sending troops down to retake the Falklands without the backing of the USA and then making a living travelling the world giving after dinner speeches on how he took the country into a war.

Gone it seems are the days when the leaders of this nation were charismatic personages and put the needs of this country before their own personal advancement.

Malena,

there was much about Maggie Thatcher that I didn"t agree with, selling the Utilities was the , privatising the Railways was another but she never used
her Parliamentary privileges , worked tirelessly (only slept 4 hours) was a match for any Foreign Leader and made sure Britain got a fair deal from the EU.

I saw her shed genuine tears when at the dockside to see the first Ship set sail to do battle with Argentina over Falkland and reduce the Union Power at a time when one out all out was the norm and crippling Manufacturing.

On the downside, she treated her Ministers like s***, saw the decimation of Communities and thousands of Miners lose their jobs when she closed the
pits.There was supposedly 300 years supply of coal, wasn"t there a way of making it cleaner? Now we import coal. Brought in the dreaded Poll Tax
and was not a caring PM for those in real need. The Conservative Government handed over a healthy Economy to Labour, say no more.!!!

I couldn't agree more Panda, she did destroy our old communities and created the conditions to allow our public utilities to be sold off. Labour had a chance to stop the decimation and would have I think had not John Smith who was a true Labour leader sadly died leaving the way open for Blair.

Slightly off topic:-
Strangely Tony Blair the Middle East Peace Person or whatever he likes to see himself titled as...
.
Blair had British troops ordered into battle five times ............more times than any other prime minister in British history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Blair

Not bad for a Peace Representative...eh?

malena stool wrote:I couldn't agree more Panda, she did destroy our old communities and created the conditions to allow our public utilities to be sold off. Labour had a chance to stop the decimation and would have I think had not John Smith who was a true Labour leader sadly died leaving the way open for Blair.

Slightly off topic:-
Strangely Tony Blair the Middle East Peace Person or whatever he likes to see himself titled as...
.
Blair had British troops ordered into battle five times ............more times than any other prime minister in British history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Blair

Not bad for a Peace Representative...eh?

Youv"e said it. You watch teflon Tony walk away from this reputation intacr and go back to the U.S.A. to give his after dinner speeches at $6000.00 a time, plus expenses while the British Taxpayer pays £6 million a year for his security.

There are suggestions one MP subject to investigation has "grassed" on 6 others (3 labour, 2 con, 1 lib including 2 ex-ministers). Rumour has it it is Illsley wot done it (presumably being the only sitting MP under investigation/being prosecuted).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1347819/MPs-expenses-Whistleblowing-MP-shops-6-colleagues-expenses-probe-police.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

Of course it raises the question, after months of investigation, that if there are at least six more why it wasn't picked up.

Thanks Chris for the Article Iv"e pasted it here. The MPs get a t 10 weeks holidays a year, are well paid, I think Generous tax free allowances, yet still
some have to cheat!!!!


Detectives are probing the expenses of six more politicians after they were reported by a disgruntled Labour MP.

The MP, who is said to be angry that he was unfairly singled out over his own claims, has ‘shopped’ two ex-Cabinet ministers and four MPs.

Three are from the Labour party, two are Conservative and one is a Liberal Democrat.

It is the first time that an MP has accused colleagues of making false claims and there is speculation that the whistle-blower may be Eric Illsley.

The Labour MP for Barnsley Central pleaded guilty at Southwark Crown Court last week to dishonestly claiming more than £14,000 in expenses for council tax and other household bills.

Commons sources said the whistleblower had been the subject of a police investigation and had told officers about colleagues who had made similar expenses claims.

The allegations of fraud relate to household expenditure such as council tax, maintenance and utility bills, according to the Sunday Times.

Last night Scotland Yard declined to comment on the reports but said a number of cases were still being looked at.

So far ten files have been handed to the Crown Prosecution Service by the Met’s economic and specialist crime unit.

Six have led to charges, on two no further action has been taken, and two others remain under consideration.

This month, former Labour MP David Chaytor became the first to be jailed over the scandal. He was given an 18-month sentence after admitting false accounting.

The first peer to be accused of expenses fraud is due to go on trial today. Lord Taylor of Warwick, a former Tory peer, faces six charges of false accounting relating to overnight subsistence and mileage between March 2006 and October 2007.

The trials of Jim Devine, the former Labour MP for Livingston, and Elliot Morley, a former Labour minister, are to take place later this year.

A date has not yet been set for the trial of Lord Hanningfield, the former Tory leader of Essex Council, who faces charges of false accounting over claims for overnight accommodation.

David Cameron, meanwhile, is set to intervene to deny MPs a £1,000 pay rise.

An independent review body is expected to recommend an increase that would see their £65,738 salaries go up by about £20 a week – around 1.5 per cent.



















Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1347819/MPs-expenses-Whistleblowing-MP-shops-6-colleagues-expenses-probe-police.html#ixzz1By9aTajE

I see the jury were unmoved by the "everybody does it" argument and found Lord Taylor guilty. Sentencing at some date to be determined.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12275821