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Something smells fishy

Forget ID cards, they are so yesterday. Der Spiegel Online reports:

A new weapon has been found in the global war on terror. Amid all the modern equipment and techniques such as computer networks, digital data profiling and the planned online access to PCs, the age-old method of scent analysis is enjoying a revival.

The Stasi secret police used scent gathering in Communist East Germany, collecting smells in empty jam jars and storing them. The method has reminded Germans of that failed regime of snoopers, and was highlighted in the recent Oscar-winning film "The Lives of Others" about a Stasi surveillance officer.

Let's see, they need an officer who can smell something bad even when no one else can detect it.

Got John Yates's phone number anyone?

(Hat Tip: Bruce Schneier)

Why the cash for honours inquiry is a success

The cash for honours fiasco? A triumph.

The purpose of raising money is to advance a party's political cause. But if you handle donors and donations carelessly you risk damaging the party's cause more than the money secured advances it. In a competitive political system, you won't do this too often. That's why democracy works.

The CPS was not able to find enough evidence of lawbreaking to feel confident of securing a conviction. But the decision to offer posts as Labour working peers to a number of recent donors with very little in the way of Labour links was still a poor one. And something that should be discouraged.

As a result of the investigation, Labour won't do it again. Nor will anyone else. The money will be judged not worth the potential political costs.

No one goes to jail. We can move on from the whole boring issue. And it won't happen again. See what I mean? A triumph.   

Describing Levy

I know that Stephen Pollard got there first. I know that I said I didn't think that the main reason for Michael Levy being in the spotlight was because he was Jewish. But this is very funny and contains a good deal of truth.

Is it cos Levy is a Jew?

Now. Lord Levy.

Yesterday The Times ran this:

Lord Levy’s rabbi, Yitzchak Schochet, said Jews were scared that the inquiry would lead to “one Jew being hung out to dry”.

Firstly, is this true? Yes, I think it is. Michael Levy is respected in the Jewish community for his work for charity and his success in business and politics. And Jews (including me) are saddened that he is in trouble. There is also a feeling of community embarrassment that a prominent and successful Jew should end up as the one in the firing line.

Second, has there been anti-Semitism in coverage of Lord Levy's plight? Well, from time to time, there have been careless headlines (e.g. You've got to pick a pocket or two) and descriptions (bouffant hairdo and so on) that Jews are sensitive about and might have been better avoided.

But, third, is Lord Levy in the spotlight because he is a Jew? Has he been "hung out to dry" because he is the only Jew involved? Is anti-Semitism the cause of the position he finds himself in?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Rabbi Schochet is making a terrible error. If you start hinting at anti-Semitism whenever a Jew is in trouble you undermine the very idea. You make people wary of real claims, ones justified by the evidence.

There's enough genuine anti-Semitism about. And it is difficult enough to make people take it seriously.

Does the police have anything on cash for peerages?

The injunction obtained by the Metropolitan Police against Nick Robinson has given birth to a great deal of speculation. But it has made one thing horribly clear.

Supporters of the Prime Minister have been arguing that the pattern of police arrests suggested that they didn't really have anything.

Forget Guido, they said. The dawn swoops were an attempt to intimidate witnesses into coughing up something, anything, that could be used. Yates of the Yard was aiming for a spot on Celebrity Big Brother, his motivation similar to that copper who nicked Mick Jagger and George Harrison on dope charges.

More than one attempt was made to encourage me to write this.

But I always responded by asking - how do you know? The link between cash and peerages seems fairly obvious to me, but let's wait and see whether there's any hard evidence that would hold up in court, shall we?

The Nick Robinson saga shows that the police definitely do have something, something hard. Otherwise they wouldn't need to protect it with an injunction, now would they?

Newsnight and the BlogSpat

So last night Newsnight duly ran the story about Colin Challen and Ed Balls that Iain Dale and I have been arguing about. What did we learn?

Well, not a lot really. Colin Challen denied having been offered anything in exchange for standing down in his seat, the Treasury said he hadn't been and Tory spokesman Chris Grayling said he didn't believe either of them.

I don't think this alters the story. It may be, for instance, that Mr Brown was applying the rule of reciprocation that I've written about before. Challen might have been given a role on climate change and resigned out of "goodwill". Either way, I accept the idea that Ed Balls and Gordon Brown have induced him to stand aside.

So why don't I accept that it is a scandal?

Not because I am complacent about scandals, as Iain suggests. I think the highest standards are vital. I would never wish to ignore a scandal or argue that true scandal shouldn't be investigated.

And not because I love the Brown-Balls partnership. I think the reliance of the Chancellor on Mr Balls has not been a good thing and that their relationship is stifling and unhealthy.

My problem is more basic. My problem is that I don't think that moving someone to another role for which they are qualified in order to encourage them to vacate an office is scandalous.

I am not arguing that politicians should be subject to different rules from the rest of us. I think what has happened to Colin Challen is exactly what happens everywhere, all the time in every workplace. And why shouldn't it?

Please, don't just assert it's a scandal. Please don't just say that the Murdoch media loves Gordon Brown this week. Please don't just say that commentariat are cut off. That's not good enough. I need a proper argument.

So please just someone, somewhere explain what's wrong with it and why its scandalous.

That, or just give it up.

Gordon Brown's comment on cash for peerages

I have been reflecting on Gordon Brown's comment regarding the cash for peerages affair:

I believe when people see the full facts then they will be satisfied.

This is a rather odd comment, if you think about it.

Gordon Brown has always maintained he does not know the full facts, and that the whole thing has got nothing to do with him. So how can he be sure that people will be satisfied when they see the full facts?

No comment

Tony Blair on Ruth Turner 2007:

Ruth is a person of the highest integrity for whom I have great regard and I continue to have complete confidence in her

William Hague on Jeffrey Archer 1999:

This candidate is a candidate of probity and intergity - I am going to back him to the hilt

Cash for peerages: The BBC's reporting isn't the problem with politics

There's an entertaining difference of opinion between The Independent's Steve Richards (here) and the BBC's Nick Robinson (here) about the coverage of the police interview with Blair. Richards's key charge is this:

The BBC is not anti-Labour or pro-Tory, but unable to take a stand on policy issues, and, wanting to make waves, it has inadvertently become anti-politics.

Robinson responds thus:

This simply won’t do. A senior police officer in charge of an investigation which is unprecedented in British political history has stated publicly that his inquiry team has "significant and valuable material" and hints that charges may follow..... The BBC is not being “anti politics” when it reports those facts.

I'm with Nick. The idea that the police interview was unremarkable is ridiculous.

I think that cynicism about politics and politicians is dangerous and both the media (the BBC is less guilty than most) and politicans can encourage it. A fightback is in order. But if I were in charge of the fightback strategy, the loans affair is not the event I would pick.

Tony Blair's explanation on his peerage nominations doesn't add up

Tony Blair's explanation of his peerage nominations was intriguing. According to his spokesman:

The Prime Minister explained why he nominated each of the individuals and he did so as party leader in respect of the peerages reserved for party supporters as other party leaders do.

The honours were not, therefore, for public service but expressly party peerages given for party service.

The Prime Minister is right to explain that a peerage is a political office rather than a conventional honour. But he fails to comprehend that it is precisely this that made his choices so curious.

The various people he nominated for peerages in the most recent batch were deserving of honours - they were people with distinguished records in business and many charitable works to their name. Knighthoods were quite in order. One or two might even have been worthy for consideration for a cross bench peerage on a different list.

But as working Labour peers? That's quite a different matter. At least one of them was openly a Tory. None had strong party identification or records.

Usually the Prime Minister is good at selecting his argument. I think in this case he has made the situation worse.