Briefing from the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman on: Meetings, Downing Street Lecture, Lords Reform, Euro, Richard Desmond/Party Funding, Hooliganism/World Cup and Rail.
Meetings
The Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) advised journalists that the Prime Minister would be meeting Prime Minister Thaksin of Thailand at midday today. They would discuss bilateral issues, including trade, investment and the fight against international terrorism. This afternoon, the Prime Minister, together with Clare Short, would meet Prime Minister Deuba of Nepal. They were expected to discuss the Maoist insurgency in the region.
Downing Street Lecture
The PMOS said that the Prime Minister was due to attend a lecture in Downing Street this evening given by Martin Narey on the criminal justice system. Asked whether Mrs Blair would be chairing the Q&A, the PMOS said yes, as she had done on many occasions in the past.
Lords Reform
The PMOS advised journalists that Robin Cook and the Lord Chancellor would be making Statements in the House of Commons and House of Lords respectively regarding the next steps for reform of the Upper House. We had said we would be setting out the way forward before the summer recess and today we were doing so. Asked for further detail about the Statements’ contents, the PMOS said that journalists would have to wait and see. Obviously Parliament should be the first to hear.
Euro
Asked whether the GGC/NOP survey, as reported in today’s Telegraph, was an accurate account of the Government’s information on the state of public mind about the Euro, the PMOS said that as he understood it, it was an accurate report of that particular piece of polling. However, it was important to recognise that it was not a strategy document on the single currency. It did not contain any notional dates for any referendum. It was simply a polling analysis of trends concerning public opinion on Europe and the single currency.
Questioned as to whether the ‘evidence’ had been shown to the Prime Minister, the PMOS said that we were not talking about a piece of Government polling, although it had been shared with the Government. There were all sorts of surveys going on the whole time, some done by the private sector, others not. Pressed as to whether the Prime Minister had seen this particular poll, the PMOS said he did not whether the Prime Minister had scrutinised every single page of it. He underlined that the Government’s position on the single currency had not changed. There were five economic tests. This was all about an economic union and therefore the economics had to be right.
Asked whether the GGC report had been drawn up at the request of the Prime Minister, the PMOS repeated that this was not private polling which had been done for the Prime Minister. It was a piece of work which had been carried out and shared with the Government. This sort of work went on the whole time. Indeed, newspapers often commissioned polls themselves. Asked whether the Government had paid for it, the PMOS said no, although the findings had been shared with the Government.
Questioned as to whether the report suggested a quickening of the pace in the approach to the Euro and a referendum, the PMOS said that the policy remained the policy. It had not changed. Pressed as to whether it showed that the Prime Minister was taking a more serious attitude towards the issue, the PMOS said that the Government had always had a very serious attitude towards it because it was a very serious subject. That was why the Treasury was currently carrying out the preliminary technical work for the assessment. As we had stated many times in the past, an assessment against the five economic tests would be made within the first two years after the Election. Nothing had changed.
Richard Desmond/Party Funding
Questioned about the weekend reports regarding Party funding and Richard Desmond’s donation to the Labour Party, the PMOS drew journalists’ attention to a Monday morning briefing he had given three or four weeks ago when he had had to deal with yet another of these ’stories’. He had said at the time that it had felt like Groundhog Day. It was Groundhog Day again. He had also predicted that we would be back here discussing another over-ventilated piece of Sunday paper journalism before too long. So it had come to pass. As we had underlined on many occasions, it was this Government which had introduced openness and transparency into the party funding system. As a result of the new rules, Mr Desmond’s donation would have been made public later this year anyway. It would appear, however, that the media and others had declared ‘open season’ on all donors.
Asked whether the Prime Minister had met Richard Desmond on 26 November 2001, the PMOS said that those of us who had been working had answered many questions on this subject over the weekend. As we had already spelled out, yes, the Prime Minister had met Mr Desmond and no, they had not discussed party funding.
Asked whether the Prime Minister shared John Reid’s view that the ‘morality’ and ethical stance of a donor was not important, the PMOS said that as he was a Civil Servant, it was not appropriate for him to discuss donations to political parties. He could however, make a general observation on the way the story had been running in the media. At the beginning we had had to deal with the accusation that meetings of a certain nature and involving the Prime Minister. Simply not true. The story had then moved on to the idea that the Express Group’s merger had been nodded through by the then Trade and Industry Secretary, Stephen Byers, because a donation had been given - or was about to be given - to the party. Again, that was patently not true because he had been acting on the advice of the Director General of Fair Trading, in line with the policy to take politics out of such decisions, as announced in October 2000. So what was left? A discussion about Richard Desmond giving money to the Labour Party. Wow.
Put to him that the Secretary of State should have taken the issue of public interest into account - no matter what the Director General had recommended, the PMOS said that the Director General was perfectly able to make an assessment as to whether something was in the public interest or not. His recommendation would then have gone to the Secretary of State. In his Statement of 26 October, Mr Byers had made it clear that he would contravene that advice only in exceptional circumstances, for example if a merger raised issues of national security. As he had said, "Today’s announcement reflects my view that the Director General is best placed to assess competition issues in individual cases".
Put to him that a number of backbench party MPs, not usually noted for criticising the Government, had openly expressed unease over Mr Desmond’s donation because of some of the publications he owned, the PMOS said that the brouhaha over the last 48 hours or so had centred on some sort of cash-for-favours allegation. Plainly that was wrong. The fact that some parts of the media today had included a ‘what they gave, what they got’ feature was indicative of a systematic attempt to undermine politicians and the political process. John Reid had answered questions on this topic yesterday on behalf of the party. As a Civil Servant, he was unable to deal with issues relating to party funding.
Nevertheless, he could comment on the fact that this Government was responsible for opening up the whole system. As a result of that ‘Glasnost’, people could see that there was an interface between those who gave to political parties and the Government. It should come as no surprise that there would be occasions when donors to the party would win contracts for example. But it was very difficult to prove a negative - that there was no impropriety - if people were not prepared ultimately to believe the word of the Permanent Secretary at the Department of Health, the word of the British Ambassador in Romania, or the word of the Director General of Fair Trading. In the end, people would just have to make their own judgements.
Put to him that all this added weight to the argument that there should be state funding of political parties, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister’s view on this issue remained unchanged. There was no party consensus for state funding. Unless there was, it would be difficult to move in that direction. Questioned as to whether the Prime Minister had spoken to the Opposition Leader to discuss the issue, the PMOS said no. Asked whether Mrs Blair, in her capacity as a ‘moderator’ and successful lawyer, had a view about the morality of accepting money from Richard Desmond, the PMOS said he hadn’t asked her.
Asked if the Prime Minister had a view as to whether the source of the money mattered, the PMOS again questioned whether we were having a debate about the source of the money or allegations of cash-for-favours. Much of what we had been dealing with yesterday had appeared to centre on a charge of impropriety, the allegation being that the Government had acted improperly as a result of a donation which had been made. Had that been the case, then yes, it would fundamentally have been wrong. However, that hadn’t happened. He suggested that the media’s response to the different issues which had been raised over the last few months, ranging from Mittal to PowderJect to Mr Desmond, in effect attacked the integrity of the officials involved, including Ambassadors and Permanent Secretaries.
Put to him by the BBC that that it was accepted there was no impropriety, yet there were concerns over accepting money from Mr Desmond, the PMOS said that had not appeared to be the BBC view for the last 36 hours when this story had been covered.
Asked why he was refusing to give the Prime Minister’s view on this particular ‘ethical matter’, the PMOS said that Labour Party funding was not a matter for him. John Reid, as a senior member of the Government, had answered the question yesterday. Pressed as to whether the Prime Minister agreed with John Reid, the PMOS said the Prime Minister believed that Dr Reid was an excellent Secretary of State.
Asked if he was implying that the Prime Minister was indifferent to the source of the money which funded his party, the PMOS said that as the Prime Minister had stated many times, raising money for individual political parties was the job that politicians liked least. However, in order to fund democracy - which he thought most people would agree was a good thing - it was an important and necessary job. Asked to explain why it was the part of the job that politicians liked least, the PMOS said he would have thought it was pretty obvious.
Pressed further, the PMOS said that a Prime Minister was elected to run the country. As such, he would focus his energy on sorting out the economy, improving public services, enhancing Britain’s role on the world stage, and a vast array of other things. However, he was also leader of a political party which, in order to be effective, needed an infrastructure and officials to run it - hence the need for funding. As the leader, it was obvious that he would have to play a role in soliciting funds. No doubt he would rather be doing something else. However, because we did not have state funding in this country, it was necessary.
Asked if he was implying that the Prime Minister believed that some donations, such as that given by Richard Desmond, were legitimate and moral, whereas others, such as those given by tobacco companies, were considered to be illegitimate and immoral, the PMOS repeated that, as a Civil Servant, he was unable to comment on party funding issues beyond what he had already said.
Asked whether the Prime Minister would be discussing the issue with any of his Cabinet Ministers, such as Clare Short whom he would be seeing this afternoon when they met the Prime Minister of Nepal, the PMOS said he would have thought they would be discussing the Maoist insurgency, which was rather more important. Asked if that was one of the magazines owned by Mr Desmond, the PMOS suggested that it might be time to move on to another topic.
Hooliganism/World Cup
Asked what special measures the Government was taking to prevent hooliganism at the World Cup in light of BBC2’s programme on the issue last night and the recent Millwall clashes, the PMOS said that we deplored any hooliganism, particularly the events in south London at the end of the season. Clearly the Government took the problem very seriously, which was why we had brought forward legislation, such as Banning Orders to prevent people travelling abroad to a game, to deal with it. Asked whether the Prime Minister was planning to attend the World Cup, the PMOS said there were no plans for him to do so.
Rail
Asked the latest estimation for when Railtrack would be out of administration, the PMOS said that John Spellar had answered that question yesterday in his Sky interview. We couldn’t put a date on it at this stage. The purpose of Stephen Byers’ funding offer to shareholders just before Easter had been to demonstrate to them that there was an opportunity cost for Railtrack coming out of administration more quickly. It was now for the shareholders and the company to consider that point. If, however, he was being asked the question because of safety and the crash, he would make the point that being in administration had had no material effect on safety.
As John Armitt himself had said yesterday, "In terms of the day-to-day running of the railway and the operation of the railway, all the people in Railtrack get on with their jobs in the normal way….I do not have any reason to believe that the fact that this has been happening, i.e. administration, has any impact on our ability to carry out our normal job of maintaining and operating the railway". The HSE themselves had made a similar point, saying that "There is not evidence to suggest that administration is having any adverse effect on safety".
Asked to explain why the nuts and bolts belonging to the points had been discovered lying beside the track, the PMOS said that clearly we knew what had happened - but we did not yet know why. Until we did, it was very difficult to draw wider conclusions. The HSE was looking into the matter very carefully, as you would expect. Asked how we could rule out the fact that ‘re-nationalisation’ had not had any knock-on effect on the railways, the PMOS pointed out that the rail network had not been re-nationalised. As both Stephen Byers and John Armitt had said yesterday, at this stage we were unable to rule out whether the derailment had been the result of poor maintenance, negligence or vandalism.
Until we had the answers, it was very difficult to look at the wider picture. The point he was making was that the level of maintenance - and the amount of money being invested in maintenance - had been increasing over the last year. The administration had not had material effect on that, although of course no one was pretending that what had happened on Friday wasn’t a very difficult situation for the industry to deal with and a tragedy for the families and friends of those killed and injured. Obviously it was.
Asked to provide figures showing the investment that had been put in, the PMOS said that in the current year, £1.1bn would be spent on maintenance compared to £0.95bn last year, and £0.65bn three years ago. This was not a demonstration of our complacency. Quite the contrary. Clearly what had happened should not have happened and it was important to find out why it had.
Asked whether the HSE report would be made available in time for Stephen Byers’ Statement to the House this afternoon, the PMOS said it was unlikely. As things stood, Mr Byers would not be able to say a great deal more as to why the accident had happened. We would have to await the result of the forensic tests that were currently being carried out and the interim HSE report.
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