Thread: Election Fraud in the UK

If as it now seems some Tory MPs are being interviewed for fraudulent election expenses, this could lead to by-elections . May could lose her majority...

... Or not.

just in time for Brexit

Fiddling expenses is not election fraud, different crime. Much as I dislike the Tories this whole thing is just a storm in a teacup. Also, where's the fkn link?

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Fiddling expenses is not election fraud, different crime. Much as I dislike the Tories this whole thing is just a storm in a teacup. Also, where's the fkn link?

Storm in teacup it maybe but allow them to get away with it and we'll soon have an American system where the wealthiest man wins, bought and paid for govenments, the spiral of corruption will descend even further than it already has under this tory plague.

Originally Posted by Stinky

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Fiddling expenses is not election fraud, different crime. Much as I dislike the Tories this whole thing is just a storm in a teacup. Also, where's the fkn link?

Storm in teacup it maybe but allow them to get away with it and we'll soon have an American system where the wealthiest man wins, bought and paid for govenments, the spiral of corruption will descend even further than it already has under this tory plague.

Fiddling expenses is not a uniquely tory phenomenon.

Link from the Bolshevik Broadcasting Corp.

MP Craig Mackinlay quizzed over election expenses - BBC News

Storm in a teacup, basically the Tories had their 'battle bus' driving round the country and when was in whatever constituency the cost of the bus wasn't being declared as an expense for that MP in whatever constituency it happened to be in.

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Also, where's the fkn link?

Suppose this one. Sounds like political sensationalism. Alleged, grilled by police?

Top Tory MP faces six-hour police grilling over alleged election fraud - Mirror Online

Originally Posted by Stinky

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

Originally Posted by Stinky

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Fiddling expenses is not election fraud, different crime. Much as I dislike the Tories this whole thing is just a storm in a teacup. Also, where's the fkn link?

Storm in teacup it maybe but allow them to get away with it and we'll soon have an American system where the wealthiest man wins, bought and paid for govenments, the spiral of corruption will descend even further than it already has under this tory plague.

Fiddling expenses is not a uniquely tory phenomenon.

I think it is on this scale?

I don't.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...r_backbenchers

The Conservatives have been fined £70,000 after an investigation into its election expenses, the Electoral Commission has said.

The investigation found "significant failures" by the party to report how much it spend on the 2015 General Election campaign - and three by-elections in 2014.

It found:

:: The expenses returns for the 2015 election were missing at least £104,765 of payments

:: £118, 125 of payments were incorrectly reported or not reported at all

:: Receipts for 81 payments to the value of £52,924 were not provided

:: No records kept for amounts invoiced to candidates in three 2014 by-elections.

Chair of the Electoral Commission Sir John Holmes warned that this was the third investigation where parties had been slapped with large fines but and warned that it no longer appeared to act as an incentive to play by the rules.

He said: "This is the third investigation we have recently concluded where the largest political parties have failed to report up to six figure sums following major elections, and have been fined as a result.

"There is a risk that some political parties might come to view the payment of these fines as a cost of doing business; the Commission therefore needs to be able to impose sanctions that are proportionate to the levels of spending now routinely handled by parties and campaigners."

It came as it was disclosed that file from 12 police forces relating to expenses during the 2015 general election have been passed to the Crown Prosecution Service.

Conservatives fined £70,000 over election expenses

15 MARCH 2017 • 4:39PM
MPs will be banned from hiring their children and spouses on the public purse after the next election, it has been announced.

Politicians will be barred from using taxpayers’ money to employ relatives and other “connected” people from 2020, the expenses watchdog has said.

Such contracts are “out of step with modern employment practice”, according to Ruth Evans, chairman of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA).

It comes after criticism that allowing MPs to hire relatives is "unjust" and encourages "nepotism".

Some 139 spouses, family members and other “connected” individuals are employed MPs currently at a cost to the taxpayer of 4.5 million a year.

None of those currently in roles will be forced to resign, with the rule change only applying to new hires after the May 2020 election.

The tightening in the rules, which was first revealed by The Sunday Telegraph, is part of the biggest shake-up in rules for six years.

Other changes include a £2,000 increase in how much MPs can spend on renting accommodation in London and a higher allowance for those with children.

Ms Evans, the Ipsa chair, said: “We have decided to end funding for new employees who are related to MPs from the next General Election onwards.

“We believe that the employment of ‘connected parties’ is out of step with modern employment practice, which requires fair and open recruitment to encourage diversity in the workplace.”

Ipsa, the watchdog set up after this newspaper’s expenses watchdog, announced the changes after a consultation on its rules.

The body decided to reject a total ban in the Scottish Parliament which would have forced wives and children currently working for MPs.

However sources feared a repeat of the French scandal that has seen François Fillon’s presidential bid derailed by claims he paid his wife for work she did not do. He has rejected the allegations.

Concerns about MPs hiring family members have persisted since a new system of rules came into place after the expenses scandal.

Ipsa said that one MP said politicians employing family members was “unjust and encouraged nepotism”. It also noted concerns were raised about the professionalism of the job.

The watchdog did note the “majority” of MPs supported no change in the rules.

“The response from a group of Conservative MPs stated that spouses can represent good value for money as they often work well beyond the hours that other staff would be prepared to work,” it said.

“MPs who employed connected parties themselves gave personal reasons why the practice should be allowed to continue, such as the need for a member of staff whom they can trust completely and who is willing and able to take on the necessary evening and weekend working.”

However it concluded: “MPs should be expected to follow best practice in their approach to recruiting and managing their staff, as well as to ensure the proper use of public funding. We acknowledge the need for MPs to employ people they can trust, but do not consider that these can only be connected parties.

“We have also noted that other legislatures have followed this best practice; the employment of connected parties is already restricted in the legislatures of Scotland, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.”

Other changes were announced. MPs will be able to spend around £2,000 more than previously for renting accommodation in London, with the budget now £22,760 a year.

The extra amount they can claim for each child in accommodation costs is also doubling from £2,425 to £5,435. MPs will only be able to claim for up to three children.

Politicians will be able to travel to Europe as many times as wanted after a cap on three return journeys a year was lifted in the wake of the Brexit vote.

Staff bonuses have also been capped for the first time, with no employee able to be given more than £1,000 a year.

MPs will be banned from hiring family members at the public's expense, IPSA says as 130 relatives of MPs could lose their jobs

UK Channel 4 news reporting CPS considering charges against over 30 people including Tory MPs over expenses.
15 police forces have passed files to the CPS.

All 4

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

15 MARCH 2017 • 4:39PM
MPs will be banned from hiring their children and spouses on the public purse after the next election, it has been announced.

Politicians will be barred from using taxpayers’ money to employ relatives and other “connected” people from 2020, the expenses watchdog has said.

Hmmm will they bring that forward I wonder.

Originally Posted by Bower

ON MIRROR.CO.UK



HomeNewsPoliticsConservative Party
Tory Craig Mackinlay charged over alleged election fraud
Mr Mackinlay was elected MP for South Thanet, defeating then-Ukip leader Nigel Farage to the seat


10:32, 2 JUN 2017UPDATED11:11, 2 JUN 2017
NEWS
Craig Mackinlay, MP for Thanet South

That explains it!
Carn't have Sir Nigel becoming an MP.
Ship in the activists and put them up for free in a nice hotel with free food and drink, throw the bus and the sink at Farage and play it all down afterwards

Beginning to look like those Tories did it again, this time using a call centre .Advertisement




Conservatives
Conservative party call centre 'may have broken election law'
Channel 4 News investigation questions whether market research staff were actually canvassing for candidates

Holly Watt
Thursday 22 June 2017 19.00 BST Last modified on Thursday 22 June 2017 22.00 BST
The Conservative party allegedly operated a secret call centre during the election campaign that may have broken data protection and election laws, according to an investigation by Channel 4 News.

An undercover investigation by the programme has found that the party used a market research firm to make thousands of cold calls to voters in marginal seats in the weeks before the election.

Call centre employees working on behalf of the party used a script that appeared to canvass for support rather than conduct market research. On the day of the election, call centre employees contacted voters to promote individual candidates, which may be a breach of electoral law, the investigation claimed.

At the start of the election campaign, the information commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, wrote to all the major political parties reminding them of the law around telephone calls and data protection. She said that calling voters to promote a political party was “direct marketing” and was regulated by law.


‘Hello, can we count on your vote?’ How I hit the phones for three different parties

The government also announced during the campaign that it wanted to tighten up the laws on nuisance calls and a bill on the issue was included in the Queen’s speech.

The Channel 4 News investigation, which ran over several weeks, found that a team employed by the Conservatives rang voters from a call centre in Neath, south Wales.

Operating from a script, the staff carried out calls for “market research” and “polling”. Identifying likely Tory voters in marginal seats could be important for the get-out-the-vote operation on election day, and also enable a political party to better direct its canvassing operation.

On election day, undecided voters were told that “the election result in your marginal constituency is going to be very close between Theresa May’s Conservatives and Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party”.



They were then asked: “So does knowing that you live in a marginal constituency that will determine who is prime minister for the Brexit negotiations, does that make you a lot more likely to vote for Theresa May’s Conservative candidate or a little more likely to vote for Theresa May’s Conservative candidate, or are you still unsure, or does it not make a difference?”

At an earlier stage of the campaign, the call centre staff said they were calling from a company called Axe Research, which does not appear to exist. Under the Data Protection Act, callers must disclose who they are and how the data will be used.

Asked what Axe Research was, one supervisor told Channel 4 News: “It’s just the name we do these surveys under, basically. I did a Google search, nothing comes up. But as far as anyone’s concerned, yeah, we’re a legit independent market research company.”

A week before the election, the same call centre staff started saying they were calling on behalf of Theresa May’s Conservatives.

The Conservative party said the call centre was conducting market research on its behalf, and was not canvassing for votes. The call centre confirmed it was employed by the party, but denied canvassing on its behalf.

A Conservative spokesman said: “Political parties of all colours pay for market research and direct marketing calls. All the scripts supplied by the party for these calls are compliant with data protection and information law.”

Evidence obtained by Channel 4 News suggests that on the day of the election, staff called voters in 10 marginal seats, including Bridgend, Gower, Clwyd South and Wrexham.

According to the Representation of the People Act, it is illegal to employ someone “for payment or promise of payment as a canvasser for the purpose of promoting or procuring a candidate’s election”.

Anya Proops, a QC specialising in information law, said that political parties had to ensure that third parties working on their behalf followed the law: “There are restraints, legal constraints in the Representation of the People Act, around paying people to canvass, to campaign.

“It’s an illegal practice, it’s prohibited under the legislation and in so far as it’s something which has tainted the overall result in favour of a political candidate, then it can void that result.”

She said it also raised concerns over data protection laws: “If you’re going to process my data, I should know who you are and what you’re going to do with my data. These are fundamental tenets of this legislation. And obviously what this means is that if you’ve got a situation where the company that’s calling you is concealing their true identity or is misleading the person who is receiving the call, then that is obviously a problem under the privacy legislation.”

An undercover reporter for Channel 4 was recruited by Blue Telecoms, which is run by Sascha Lopez, a businessman who stood as a local council candidate for the Tories in the 2017 local elections.

Lopez said: “In relation to the Conservative party project, I am unable to comment on the content of the scripts or calls to TPS [Telephone Preference Service] numbers, as the scripts and lists of who to call and when to call were given to us by Conservative campaign HQ in London and were not influenced by my team. However I can advise we were engaged to conduct market research and polling for the Conservative party, and at no time were we engaged to conduct any form of marketing or canvassing by the party or its candidates.” He also said they followed the regulations given by the Telephone Preference Service.

Lopez said that Blue Telecoms and Axe Research are “trading styles” of the Lopez Group.


Conservatives
Channel 4

Television industry

Data protection

General election 2017

Watched that last night outrageous and illegal activity by the Tories.
Unbelievable in this day and age, targeting marginal seats with boiler room canvassing tactics and illegal use of public data and ex directory land line numbers.