It may be transparent but it is still utterly corrupt for a Labour government to take our money, give it to the unions via the UMF and for the unions to give it back to the Labour party to use for its own political purposes. It stinks. You know this which is why you are throwing up all this chaff about Michael Ashcroft to try and create the impression that all political parties are as sleazy as each other.

The real issue here is corruption at the heart of the Labour party. Blair tried to reduce the influence of the unions over Labour policy by trying to raise money from a bunch of dodgy rich businessmen instead. When selling peerages for cash blew up in his face the party was forced back into the clutches of the unions. Thus we saw the UMF set up in 2004 and the cash started to flow. If Unite had not bailed out the Labour party financially then they would have gone bust and now we see a dubious assortment of Unite officials being eased into safe seats.

Thirteen years in and all you can do is say how awful the “wicked tories” are.

The point about Ashcroft is that he was only given a peerage after he appeared to commit to being a ‘permanent resident’ in the UK. After endless obfuscation, we now find out that he wiggled out of this commitment.

Oh, & Tyler, do you think it’s healthy that around 30% of Tory funds come from bankers & property types – who are significantly less popular than trade unions (& certainly don’t represent millions of people).

As for Lord Paul; this is a man who is in trouble over his Lords expenses, and has passed his business over to his sons, partly for tax reasons. I’ll bet he and his family won’t be paying full UK tax on their fortune even if he himself becomes domiciled.

I’m glad though that you are against all non-doms funding parties though – after all, Labour has had just under £10m from non-doms and the Tories about £4.5.

The point I was really trying to make though, is that you are playing the typical Labour confidence trick. Hypocritically focusing on one non-story about the opposition to hide the extent of Labour’s sleaze. Brown does it all the time with his “Brownies” (and let’s be very clear, they are lies) and it seems to have spread to the party grassroots. Just because you are a card waving Labour party supporter does not give you any form of moral superiority, and no amount of singing slogans will ever change that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AznSOikAHoE&feature=sub

Of course Trade Unions have influence within the Labour party – I might be mistaken but I think they were there when it was founded…. and as for Charlie Whelan, well he is Political Director of UNITE – so I think the clue is in the title. Again all fairly transparent.

I am against all non-doms funding political parties so I am glad that Lord Paul has reviewed his position:

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2010/03/160-status-lord-peer-tory

Cashcroft is deputy party chairman and wields quite a lot of influence within his party and nationally – no mean feat. Shame he can’t even be bothered to pay VAT on opinion polls that he funds for the party – so much for patriotism a la Cameron…..

http://www.newstatesman.com/2010/03/ashcroft-party-vat-polling

Are you seriously telling me that the £3.6m that UNITE have pumped into Labour have not bought influence? I’m sure Charlie Whelan and Jack Dromey’s positions, as well as a few others, has *nothing at all* to do with that money, or the £11m totall UNITE has funded Labour with since 2007. Nothing at all?

Let’s also have a quick look at the UMF as well shall we…Labour gives ~£12m of TAXPAYER money to the unions. Unions give £11m to Labour. Hmm. Suspicious, no? Even if that money is not directly being used to fund Labour, it still frees up a huge amount of money for the unions to give to Labour, which they would have otherwise had to use on the same projects. It’s nothing but a disgusting charage.

Which leaves your and Labour’s last argument – that Ashcroft promised to become domiciled if he joined the Lords. Apart from the hypocrisy of having many Labour non-odm party backers, you also have non-doms in positions of power (privy counsellor Lord Paul). Thats before you get to the Labour Lords, in government who HAVE done things bordering on the illegal (Mandelson).

Aschroft only promised to become RESIDENT in the UK, it transpires. Being non-domiciled is NOT illegal. Why should there be one rule for Ashcroft, and completely different rules for Labour non-dom peers, and given how Labour are funding themselves it is disingenuous to complain about the Tory party’s sources of funding.

I suppose though, I shouldn’t be surprised. Labour are, after all, known for hyprocisy and spin. It’s characterized the last 13 years.