Gordon Brown at it again and what should be done

I have blogged before about Gordon Brown's seemingly distant relationship with the truth. Fraser Nelson over at The Spectator Coffee House has a good article about this.

"Brown at it again on party funding

Gordon Brown is an accomplished expert in the art of misrepresentation, here's a prime example is from his press conference today:

On the political funding issue, I think the Conservative Party has exactly the same problems, revealed yesterday, in fact a problem in relation to foreign donors which is not lawful… I think the most important thing for party political party funding is that people can see this thing being sorted out as quickly as possible and that's why I regret the fact that the Conservatives have walked away from the discussions that are necessary to get an all party agreement on this issue.

Exactly the same problems? In his dreams. Four problems…

1) Cameron does not have “exactly the same problems”: no Tory is being investigated by police for a criminal act. Their problem was one of the donor not being on the electoral roll.

2) Cameron’s dodgy donation was for a mere £7,000 accepted by a local branch from someone not on the electoral roll. Labour’s was £550,000 from a donor illegally using third parties with the knowledge of the party's last general secretary.

3) The Tories handed back the cash voluntarily. Labour’s longstanding criminal practise had to be uncovered by a newspaper investigation.

4) Where is the link between this and state funding? What justifies Brown to make this leap to Sir Hayden Phillips? The way to get this “sorted out” is for Labour to obey its own laws. Not to have a state bailout for political parties because they can’t be trusted to obey the law.


But seriously, this is how Brown operates – and it’s a skill. Perhaps his biggest one. Natural as breathing, he slips out claims so outrageous that even Blair would choke on them, and he is often believed. He did this all the way through the last election campaign (with his fake claims of 'Tory cuts'), and we can expect him to keep doing so if he makes it to the next election."


This is right on the money and some of the comments in the Coffee House are worth publicising further....

"Jo - Exactly so. However, it is the Opposition's job to ensure that Brown is not allowed to get away with these statements. One should be able to rely on the media to point out these misrepresentations but with a few honourable exceptions this is unlikely to happen. Brown will continue to say that black is white and vice versa (read Tom Bower's biography of GB for chapter and verse) for as long as he is allowed to. Landing a few good punches at PMQ is not enough: the Tories need to deconstruct the GB myths at every opportunity."

"Mike - The Conservatives need to get their "rapid rebuttal" service up and running asap to counter Browns blatant lies. Plus they need to show him up to be the spinner and liar he is"


and the one that I think bears repeating again and again:

"TGF UKIP - Brown gets away with it because the Tories allow him to. At a similar stage Blair, Brown Campbell & Mandelson were ferociously dismembering John Major. It was bareknuckle, eye gouging, below the belt stuff - and it worked, boy did it work! No use you Tories huffing and puffing in The Speccie or the The Telegraph (now promoters of Brown anyway) about his skill in "the art of misrepresentation" that simply by-passes at least 90% of the population. It,s time to do a "Gordon" back and get down and get dirty. Cameron, or someone very senior (my man DD would have just the right touch) needs to go on the BBC, ideally on Marr, and use the "L" word and when Marr responds "Are you really calling our PM a liar" the answer should come "Andrew, we're not just fed up with Browns lies and misrepresentations we're even more fed up with parts of the media and particularly the BBC not challenging him over what they know to be falsehoods." When Marr coughs and splutters Dave or DD should simply produce an impressive looking file and start on the examples. They won't do it of course because Dave, Boy George, Hilton and Coulson aren't Blair, Brown, Mandelson and Campbell."