Complete and Utter Zebu

Many MPs have blamed “the system” for the mess they find themselves in over expenses. They give the impression that what Gordon Brown called “the biggest parliamentary scandal for two centuries” appeared from out of the blue. If only they’d known what was going on, they’d have helped put a stop to it; but whoever’s responsible for it all getting so out of hand, it’s certainly not them.

Zebu! Not only did many senior MPs, led by ex-Speaker Martin, do all they could to ensure that details of their trough-swilling never became public but politicians, on all sides of the house, schemed to get rid of the one person who could have burst the inflating expenses bubble years ago before it got out of hand.

Elizabeth Filkin was appointed Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards in 1999, her job being to ensure that MPs followed the rules and to root out wrongdoing among our parliamentarians. This she did with vim and vigour, upsetting many MPs with what they saw as overzealousness. It was she, for instance, who investigated Trade Secretary Peter Mandelson for not declaring a £373,000 home loan from colleague Geoffrey Robinson.

According to Peter Oborne in his excellent book The Triumph of the Political Class, she exposed a “shocking pattern of arrogance, corruption, greed, bullying and deception among ministers, ordinary MPs and leading figures from the Conservative opposition.” She was, in effect, hounded from her job after a whispering campaign, with MPs of all parties either participating directly or else colluding by saying nothing.

“A shocking pattern of arrogance, corruption, greed, bullying and deception among ministers, ordinary MPs and leading figures from the Conservative opposition.” – Peter Oborne

Oborne, who has written about politics for many years, said he found it “one of the most morally disgusting episodes I have witnessed…It is essentially the story of how MPs destroyed the reputation of a woman emphatically not because she had done anything wrong, but because she was too assiduous in doing her duty.”

If they had let her continue her job of weeding out corruption and dodgy dealing in Parliament, it is probable that the MPs’ expenses scandal might never have happened. Perhaps Filkin is comforted to see how some of those who sought to oust her from her role as Parliamentary sleaze watchdog have now had their political careers terminated in turn.

We have discovered that most of those MPs who protest that what they did was “within the rules” are not, in fact, telling the truth. We intend posting about why we believe this to be the case very soon.