Thursday, September 14, 2006

Lincs Tory MEP defends shadowy cash club

While one Conservative East Midlands MEP was patching up his differences - HERE, HERE and HERE - with his Party this week, the other one has been defending a shadowy Lincolnshire organisation which funds Conservative election campaigns.

MEP Chris Heaton-Harris who lives in Lincoln, was quoted in the Lincolnshire Echo defending the Midlands Industrial Council. I didn't see the story on the Echo websie, so I'm grateful to my contact for sending me a copy.

The Echo article reveals that the Labour Party is stepping up the pressure to lift the secrecy surrounding the Midlands Industrial Council - hence the interview with the secretary of the organisation in today's Daily Telegraph which I posted on earlier today.

The unincorporated association is registered as a private club to a private address in Bassingham, near Lincoln and its membership remains a closely guarded secret.

Labour Party chairman Hazel Blears has written to every Conservative MP whose constituency had received funding from the Midlands Industrial Council to "demand that they reveal the true identity of their secret backers".

She said: "Since the bankrollers of MIC refuse to come clean, it is time the Tories did."

4 comments:

Chris Palmer said...

Tell me Phil, what do you think of this Labour Government's Union Modernisation fund - the one where they steal taxpayers money, give it to the Unions, who promptly give it to the Labour party.

Oh yes, the Labour party are such honest souls.

fairdealphil said...

Chris:

i haven't read about that one in the Telegraph or the Sunday Times, or the Observer, or the Lincs Echo.

i'm sure they'd be interested if what you say has a grain of truth.

But i've read a lot lately in all these papers about the Midland Industrial Council.

The theme that runs through all these reports is "shadowy".

Even the Telegraph today suggests their interview raises more questions than it answers.

Don't blame the messenger...

ps. love the flag.

Anonymous said...

Nobody has challenged the assertion that the mystery backers are Robert Edmiston, importer of Subaru, Isuzu and Daihatsu cars to the nation.

And the boss of JCB, the successful East Midlands firm which makes, er... JCBs.

Mr Edmiston wants school students to learn creationism, the idea that our planet is just 10,000 years old and if funding one of Tony Blair's City Academies to that end.

Anonymous said...

In my line of work, creationism seems like a cruel trick.

But then so does evolution.

Us donkeys tend to be stoics with no firm views about the origin of the planet.