tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post5613621798346451419..comments2010-07-31T19:23:09.211+01:00Comments on Tory Bear - right-wing political gossip: Bad Day for Country, Coalition and TelegraphHarry Colehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05099597763862011749noreply@blogger.comBlogger44125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-75202566016220840752010-07-31T20:09:42.365+01:002010-07-31T20:09:42.365+01:00I would like to exchange links with your site www....I would like to exchange links with your site www.blogger.com<br />Is this possible?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-54242372978690758412010-07-31T19:23:09.211+01:002010-07-31T19:23:09.211+01:00I would like to exchange links with your site www....I would like to exchange links with your site www.blogger.com<br />Is this possible?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-83606083287723115122010-06-01T15:29:25.081+01:002010-06-01T15:29:25.081+01:00Good piece generally and well put - but those are ...Good piece generally and well put - but those are outrageous slurs on Vince Cable and Simon Hughes (in the comments as well as the main piece) - on the basis of no evidence at all.Sam Chttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00272901564693319248noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-36697731846988420852010-06-01T10:59:52.013+01:002010-06-01T10:59:52.013+01:00Hello, like most of the country I really couldn&#...Hello, <br />like most of the country I really couldn&#39;t give a a flying F*** about Mr Laws being gay. His opportunity to address whom he was paying rent to was last year and he chose not to. As a millionaire he should have &amp; could have and didn&#39;t. Get thee to the back benches to atone as the voters don&#39;t want it.Silent Marjoreenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-63836414534718613082010-06-01T00:08:52.023+01:002010-06-01T00:08:52.023+01:00Historian is absolutely correct. The Danny Alexand...Historian is absolutely correct. The Danny Alexander &quot;story&quot; was nothing. Purely designed to try &amp; destabilise the Government with no substance whatsoever. If that&#39;s the worst they can find then I hope they go broke fairly sharpish - as they deserve to. They&#39;ve been a worthless rag for years and are getting worse every day.Somerlednoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-61868718312966244762010-05-31T19:39:55.057+01:002010-05-31T19:39:55.057+01:00I agree with this article. It actually angers me ...I agree with this article.<br /><br />It actually angers me when people say &quot;why couldn&#39;t he just pay for the flat himself?&quot; However much personal wealth a person has, I don&#39;t believe they should have to pay thousands of pounds out of pocket for something they need in order to do their job. He was entitled to money for a London home - and he was entitled to far more than he claimed.<br /><br />No, technically he wasn&#39;t allowed to rent from a partner. But practically every adult, regardless of their relationship with the person who owns the property, has to pay something towards their accommodation. Why should MPs be exempt from that? Why should MPs&#39; partners have to stump up the costs? Laws wasn&#39;t comfortable making the relationship known, so he claimed in a slightly different way. The amount of money he claimed wasn&#39;t excessive - in fact, it was pretty cheap for Central London.<br /><br />If he&#39;d declared the relationship, he&#39;d have been entitled to more money.<br /><br />If he&#39;d moved out and rented somewhere else, it probably would have cost more, so he&#39;d have got more money. If he&#39;d bought somewhere else, he&#39;d have been entitled to more.<br /><br />The taxpayer hasn&#39;t in any way lost out here.<br /><br />Laws was dishonest, and of course that&#39;s not a good thing. But his dishonesty has harmed nobody. It wasn&#39;t for financial gain, or some sinister political motive. It was to keep his private life private. It&#39;s unfortunate that that meant he had to lie in his public life, but ultimately, who exactly suffered by this being kept secret? I can&#39;t think of anyone.<br /><br />And now let&#39;s look at who suffers from it being made public: not just Laws, his partner and their respective families, but the government and by extension, the country. Laws is a talented and able politician and economist, and we&#39;ve lost him over something that, in my eyes at least, is trivial.<br /><br />I really hope David Laws manages to return to the Treasury at some point. He&#39;s too good to lose forever over something that essentially did no harm.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-23964420534937191892010-05-31T15:54:38.383+01:002010-05-31T15:54:38.383+01:00Benefits are part of the welfare state. MPs expens...Benefits are part of the welfare state. MPs expenses are part of their remuneration package. Not the same thing so please stop comparing them.Veebshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11705580427169926373noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-62896676033559356422010-05-31T12:31:33.833+01:002010-05-31T12:31:33.833+01:00In all honesty I&#39;d never heard of Laws till th...In all honesty I&#39;d never heard of Laws till the coalition negotiations started. Though I would say in the brief time that he has been on the radar he has impressed me immensely.<br /><br />He will be a big loss to the coalition Government.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-301466884010919082010-05-31T12:30:26.007+01:002010-05-31T12:30:26.007+01:00Those defending the Telegraph must explain why the...Those defending the Telegraph must explain why they pounced on Danny Alexander the moment he replaced Laws.historianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11922746528891041071noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-60338519540744961322010-05-31T12:23:49.945+01:002010-05-31T12:23:49.945+01:00I agree with most of what you said, though I doubt...I agree with most of what you said, though I doubt that Simon Hughes or Vince Cable would have been the suppliers. It may be acliche, but being a bisexual himself, i doubt Simon Hughes would have forced the traumatic revalation of one&#39;s sexuality on a colleague. And Vince... well, he&#39;s more on the right of the Lib Dems anyway, and contributed to The Orange Book. And why would he want to see a colleague fall?<br /><br />I think the Telegraph should be ashamed. Whether David Laws ought to have resigned is a matter for him and the Parliamentarry Standards Authority to sort out. But to play games with people like this is cruel, nevermind stupid. David Laws could have been crucial to bringing the country out of this difficult financial time. He clearly knew what he was doing in govt.<br /><br />I hope to see him return!barefootfionahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01529617698900731021noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-29045092741106206972010-05-31T12:18:22.991+01:002010-05-31T12:18:22.991+01:00The Telegraph and the expenses expose last year wa...The Telegraph and the expenses expose last year was always going to be very dangerous and very dodgy – I said it then and its coming true. When someone releases something to a newspaper for some political whimsy, for money, just to feel good, or to get their own back on somebody, then it is never going to be a good thing. It should have been released, in total, to all the media at the same time. I’m sorry TB, but The Telegraph didn’t do it fairly – for a start they rolled out all the bighitting Labour miscreants for two weeks before mentioning the Tories – why not release all the big names at once? And they were always in a position to drip out information as and when they felt like it. How was anyone else to know exactly what was in the information, until it was eventually put into the public domain, which is how it should have been done, fairly and evenly. The Telegraph could have been hiding all sorts of information for all we know. As it turned out, the Telegraph did what it wanted to do – damage the Labour Party the most in the run up to a General Election, before having a go at the Tories and the mud stuck. And where was Cameron in all this on Saturday? He was quick enough to put himself forward last year as the bastion of honesty and the man who will rid his party and the government of the expenses scandal. Yet he was surprisingly quiet on Saturday. Wonder why – embarrassed I guess. Yes, there will be more to come,,,,watch out Liberals and those hiding their sexuality!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-39349138565828582912010-05-31T11:11:36.328+01:002010-05-31T11:11:36.328+01:00I have absolutely no interest in David Laws&#39; s...I have absolutely no interest in David Laws&#39; sexuality- hidden or otherwise. I only have interest in the fact he claimed rent for a room when he shouldn&#39;t have. Disgraceful. The only honourable thing to do was resign, for that offence and that offence alone.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-22102231181745448012010-05-31T11:02:03.324+01:002010-05-31T11:02:03.324+01:00See my blog https://robthill.posterous.com/david-la...See my blog<br />https://robthill.posterous.com/david-laws<br /><br />I am very worried about the economic implications for all of us if the Telegraph and Simon Heffer succeed in bringing about the coalition&#39;s collapse.<br /><br />Above all else we need good management of our economy and stability in government if we are not to go the way of Greece.robthillhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05395525897907288480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-59769709080876080422010-05-31T10:55:46.889+01:002010-05-31T10:55:46.889+01:00Housing benefit claimants claiming when house owne...Housing benefit claimants claiming when house owned by their partner are prosecuted daily.<br /> <br /> £40,000 would get them a long prison sentence.Stevenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-39517122979441255752010-05-31T10:47:45.903+01:002010-05-31T10:47:45.903+01:00At the end of the day if the Telegraph did not pub...At the end of the day if the Telegraph did not publish this now then in a year or so a tabloid might decide to publish and cause another wave of scandals and dent public confidence again.<br /><br />Mr Laws is a thief and a fraudster, that is fact! He has lied and cheated and could have &#39;come clean&#39; himself when the initial expenses story broke, so why defend him or how he is forced out from a position of trust when he has lost the ability to command it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-30263154223394432072010-05-31T10:27:50.236+01:002010-05-31T10:27:50.236+01:00A very well written article. I have found that thr...A very well written article. I have found that through most of this rather sordid affair the most support coming from the Tories. I would have expected better from Labour, but their rather parochial and tribal instincts have kicked in. <br />I am a Lib Dem, and no fan of the coalition; but my sense of social justice would be the same whether the MP was Red, Blue or Orange; hounding out a politician; a bloody good one at that, on the spurious notion of expenses is rubbish. It was homophobic rabble rousing.Raging Reghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17330210172455905938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-63277625798447885152010-05-31T10:10:00.841+01:002010-05-31T10:10:00.841+01:00Broadly agree TB. If Laws&#39; transgression was s...Broadly agree TB. If Laws&#39; transgression was so egregious why didn&#39;t the Telegraph expose him before the election so his constituents could vote him out. This is at odds with their pre-election posturing. By the way I&#39;m no fan of Laws but this was unfair.CumbrianStuartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-42815625362746910682010-05-31T10:01:20.318+01:002010-05-31T10:01:20.318+01:00I think the tragedy here is that he felt he had to...I think the tragedy here is that he felt he had to keep his orientation secret, and nothing more. Everything flows from there - the bad decision to pay rent using public money, the discovery and his resignation, everything.<br /><br />Come on, homosexuality is something that our country is almost peerlessly accepting of, a small bigoted minority notwithstanding. It saddens me that Mr. Laws still felt he had something to be ashamed of, and that he felt he had to go to such lengths to cover it up.<br /><br />I wonder who he felt afraid of? The worst the press could have done would be to run the headline &quot;Cabinet minister is gay!&quot;. I think we stopped thinking of that as a scandal years ago.<br /><br />You&#39;d think that a man with the confidence to take up such a prominent cabinet role would also have the confidence to go &quot;all ahead full and damn the torpedoes&quot; over his sexuality. The fact that he apparently didn&#39;t is a crying shame.philhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13666353309340226068noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-82209485139396026152010-05-31T09:48:07.077+01:002010-05-31T09:48:07.077+01:00Perhaps we could step back and consider the wider ...Perhaps we could step back and consider the wider issue about attitudes to gay people.<br /><br />If society was more accepting of gay people then this wouldn&#39;t have been a story. Whether Laws&#39; defence of wanting to keep his sexuality is legitimate or not it is only a possible defence because even in 2010 it is still something people feel they want or need to keep secret.<br /><br />If Laws was straight and unmarried the Telegraph&#39;s vile tone wouldn&#39;t be credible. Similarly how much sympathy would there be for a straight man wanting to keep his relationship with a woman secret?<br /><br />We still have a long way to go. One of the driving forces of the 1967 decriminalisation of homosexuality was to stop gay people ( mostly men ) being blackmailed. It seems even that aim hasn&#39;t been achieved fully yet.<br /><br />Oh and was this article written in a rush as there are several mistakes in it.raetselhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13534569824668946187noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-2865720492650818812010-05-31T09:46:42.836+01:002010-05-31T09:46:42.836+01:00This comment has been removed by the author.Jonathan Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16057698536750889074noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-64923268617393168002010-05-31T00:11:59.291+01:002010-05-31T00:11:59.291+01:00&quot;So presumably the £40k figure mentioned incl...&quot;So presumably the £40k figure mentioned included those legal payments.&quot;<br /><br />Oh dear; if you&#39;re going to construct a theory, get the basic facts right for God&#39;s sake.<br /><br />As you state, the rules were broken from 2006 onwards, which is four years. Four years&#39; worth of rent at around £900 a month (give or take) is £40k.<br /><br />I don&#39;t like the Telegraph, but their story is a damn sight more credible than the tittle tattle you are engaging in from the sideines.<br /><br />Laws was very, very wrong in what he has done. You can&#39;t weild the axe over public spending whilst trousering public money at the same time.<br /><br />You need to accept that and grow up.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-76730520444504200682010-05-30T18:48:37.897+01:002010-05-30T18:48:37.897+01:00Spot on TB. The Telegraph reporting has been salac...Spot on TB. The Telegraph reporting has been salacious, malacious, and gaybating, even if there was a breach of the rules which might have been reported in a calm and dispassionate way. <br /><br />Frankly the Telegraph is in danger of becoming a tabloid, the way the standard of its reporting is heading. Half the paper is filled with celebrity news or fashion stories these days: who on earth is their readership supposed to be now? <br /><br />This latest piece of tawdry scandal-mongering confirms my growing view that they rather take pleasure in making others&#39; private lives a misery, and that support for decent Tory things (like Parliament) is no longer a concern so long as the cash registers keep ringing.Catohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07106413502182893622noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-17371047962609912602010-05-30T18:26:31.446+01:002010-05-30T18:26:31.446+01:00ps. As to who tipped the Telegraph off, the News...ps. As to who tipped the Telegraph off, the News of the World said they had a photographer onto him, keeping him under surveillance, poking and prying because they had the evidence of his claim, so wanted validation that he was in a relationship.<br /><br />These are the worst type of gutter press tactics.angelahttps://cyberboris.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-2812287573493971882010-05-30T18:23:22.403+01:002010-05-30T18:23:22.403+01:00https://cyberboris.wordpress.com/2010/05/29/laws-go...https://cyberboris.wordpress.com/2010/05/29/laws-goes-but-why-did-telegraph-do-it/<br /><br />Really well done for what you have written. I just could not believe that when we have found someone who can actually handle the horrible economic mess we are in, the Telegraph would deliberately go and wreck it and attempt to wreck the career of someone who is practically irreplaceable. It is the height of irresponsibility.<br /><br />As you point out, what is behind all this and what is their agenda? I couldn&#39;t help noticing that not many politicians speaking up for Laws sounded very sincere about it, including Saint Vince. Little Nickie didn&#39;t sound that heartbroken either. <br /><br />Maybe David Laws is just too good. He is clearly brilliant, and his performance in front of the House was astonishing, he is a star in the making. Maybe it was all too threatening for some of them, and they would rather muck things up for him and the country than run the risk of having to deal with such a outstanding performer and future leader.<br /><br />Apparently after his performance in the H. of C., his rating was polled and he scored way about David Cameron, Clegg, Vince, above most of them. They knew his Achilles heel and they went for it. Sickening.<br /><br />I won&#39;t be buying the Telegraph again either.angelahttps://cyberboris.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2787283052819380346.post-71190314475773885332010-05-30T17:38:26.209+01:002010-05-30T17:38:26.209+01:00Congratulations on a decent, dignified comment tha...Congratulations on a decent, dignified comment that restores my tarnished faith in humanity. Well done.Robinnoreply@blogger.com