Livejournal: Redeemed
So you thought Livejournal was just an outlet for comment-disabled suicide notes from 14-year-old goth girls? Nick Bowes, formerly the head of the Labour party’s fundraising campaign, waded into the ‘Loans for peerages’ row with a post on his Livejournal(!!) He had apparently intended to friend-lock the post, but instead sent it sailing out into the world as a pubic entry. The entire journal has now been deleted.
That ‘plopping’ sound you hear is his page in Tony Blair’s Xmas card list being dropped straight into the shitter.
His web diary suggests the rules on the declaration of donations were circumvented with loans to avoid people realising that honours were being made for high value sponsors of City academies.
Mr Bowes said: “The whole peerages thing is corrupt. It is one of the biggest forms of patronage still in the hands of the Prime Minister. I just wonder whether the PM really believes in sorting out the House of Lords, as it may just rob him of his one first-class way of rewarding big donors and sponsors of city academies.”
In his entry for 30 March, written after Labour named 12 businessmen who gave the party secret loans, Mr Bowes added: “I still think the crucial questions are (a) why were donors persuaded to change their donations into loans, and (b) to what extent was the Prime Minister involved?
“In answer to (a) you have to conclude it is because they were going to get peerages and Number 10 didn’t want people to draw a relationship between the two and (b) the Prime Minister was in it up to his neck, and was personally involved.”