"Amongst the controversial comments made to the reporter were Geoff Hoon saying he wanted to make ""some real money,"" Margaret Moran boasting she could call on a ""girls' gang"" of female ministers to help the fictitious company, and Stephen Byers describing himself as ""sort of like a cab for hire."" Byers made claims of having influenced government policy in the past for money. He claimed to have spoken with Peter Mandelson and Lord Adonis in the past to influence outcomes for National Express and Tesco. Lord Adonis admitted having private discussions with Byers about it but denied that he had"
"employment. The movement of senior civil servants and government ministers into business roles is overseen by the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (ACOBA), but it is not a statutory body and has only advisory powers. The Channel Four Dispatches programme 'Cabs for Hire', broadcast in early 2010, which showed several sitting members of Parliament and former ministers offering their influence and contacts in an effort to get lobbying jobs, has generated renewed concern about this issue. A Transparency International UK report on the subject, published in May 2011, called for ACOBA to be replaced by a statutory body with greater"
"major factor in Entwistle's resignation later that day. He played himself in the 2013 crime thriller film ""Closed Circuit"" with Eric Bana in the lead. In 2014, he appeared as himself in ""The Life of Rock with Brian Pern"". Humphrys has occasionally been criticised for his forthright interviewing style: for example, in March 1995 after being interviewed on ""Today"" the former Conservative Cabinet Minister, Jonathan Aitken, accused him of ""poisoning the well of democratic debate"", although Aitken was not supported by his fellow Cabinet Ministers, Kenneth Clarke and Douglas Hurd when they were interviewed by Humphrys on the ""Today"" programme,"
"in the first such action since the 17th century. In February 2010 there were several separate developments: In March 2010 Dispatches and The Sunday Times recorded four Members of Parliament offering lobbying in return for influence with the Cabinet. Stephen Byers, a former member of the cabinet was recorded as saying he would work for up to £5,000 a day and was like a ""cab for hire"". In March 2010 the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments revealed that Tony Blair, who had resigned as prime minister and MP on 27 June 2007 had acted as a paid business consultant to"
"from an international company. The journalists were from ""The Sunday Times"" and filming for a Channel Four investigatory series called ""Dispatches"". He was shown describing himself as a ""cab for hire"" and offering to lobby his parliamentary contacts in support of the fictitious company for a financial payment of between £3,000 and £5,000 per day. Byers claimed to have influenced outcomes for National Express and Tesco through his relationships with Lord Adonis, Transport Secretary, and Lord Mandelson, Business Secretary, respectively. He claimed that he had he phoned Mandelson to put a stop to ""massively bureaucratic"" food labelling regulations after he"
"Many Prime Ministers have used this tactic during their premierships; former Prime Minister, David Cameron, only employed one Parliamentary Private Secretary at a time during his tenure in office, but he appointed John Henry Hayes as a minister without portfolio with responsibility for the Parliamentary Conservative Party, a job typically reserved for the Parliamentary Private Secretary. The final instalment of Michael Dobbs's and the BBC's ""House of Cards"" trilogy, ""The Final Cut"", includes a character, Claire Carlsen, who serves as Prime Minister Francis Urquhart's Parliamentary Private Secretary, ultimately betraying him by attempting to leak documents about his service in the"
"as the ""Minister for Fun"" after comments he made to the waiting press on leaving 10 Downing Street on his appointment. Retaliation from the media for his ""last chance saloon"" comment came in July 1992, when Mellor's former mistress, actress Antonia de Sancha, sold her kiss and tell story of Mellor's extra-marital affair with her for £35,000. In a precursor to the ""phone-hacking"" scandal that would engulf Rupert Murdoch’s ""News of the World"" in 2006 and later in 2010, their telephone conversations had been secretly recorded by de Sancha's landlord, an activity which at the time was entirely legal in"
"2010 cash for influence scandal The 2010 cash for influence scandal was a political scandal in the United Kingdom. It was brought to public and widespread media attention by a March 2010 documentary by Dispatches in which a journalistic sting operation recorded and revealed Members of Parliament and the Lords offering to work for a fictitious political lobbying firm for fees of £3,000 to £5,000 per day. Twenty politicians were approached by the documentary: fifteen agreed to meet, ten arranged meetings, and of those ten, nine were secretly filmed. These nine included the Conservative MP, Sir John Butterfill and Labour"
"previous Parliament that were not offered a position as a Minister in coalition. In 2010 he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Jeremy Hunt MP. In July 2014 the MP stated that he would have accepted an undisclosed ministerial position but wished to use his spare time to publish a book on the scandals involving former MP Chris Huhne (who perverted the course of justice by lying about driving too fast to keep his driving licence) and the Chief Whip's plebgate incident each of which meant they lost their ministerial positions."
"and Families in the government reshuffle of September 2012. In January 2013, Loughton was involved in a political dispute involving his earlier work as a minister in the Department of Education when he compared the role of Education Secretary Michael Gove to ""Young Mr Grace"" from the British sitcom ""Are You Being Served?"", suggesting there was little interaction between ministers and staff in the department. The next day Loughton was described in an anonymous briefing from the Department of Education to ""The Spectator"" as a ""lazy, incompetent narcissist obsessed only with self-promotion"". The following month Loughton tabled ""hostile"" parliamentary questions"
"left to the viewer to decide whether Weisel is still seeking to reduce the size of government or has accepted the quango for personal gain — or a little of both. (This is his last appearance in ""Yes, Minister"".) Jobs for the Boys ""Jobs for the Boys"" is the seventh episode of the BBC comedy series ""Yes Minister"" and was first broadcast 7 April 1980. In this episode, the final ""Yes Minister"" is uttered by Sir Humphrey Appleby. This is the last episode to feature Jim Hacker's political advisor, Frank Weisel, played by Neil Fitzwiliam. Sir Humphrey Appleby is in"
"Jobs for the Boys ""Jobs for the Boys"" is the seventh episode of the BBC comedy series ""Yes Minister"" and was first broadcast 7 April 1980. In this episode, the final ""Yes Minister"" is uttered by Sir Humphrey Appleby. This is the last episode to feature Jim Hacker's political advisor, Frank Weisel, played by Neil Fitzwiliam. Sir Humphrey Appleby is in Jim Hacker's office with Bernard, and is somewhat anxious. His Minister is about to take part in a radio programme and will refer to the ""Solihull project"" — a construction enterprise that is apparently ""a shining example of a"
"one of which was Mark Clarke. On 29 November 2015, a special thirteen-minute profile on Mark Clarke was aired on BBC's flagship current affairs radio channel, Radio 4. The programme was an exploration of the reasons that resignations were occurring and being sought in some of the highest offices in the Conservative Party and government; it included discussion of the then-recent resignation of the International Development Minister. The documentary also contained assertions that Clarke's political activities may well have tipped the balance of the General Election in favour of the Conservatives, but also that he had quickly become ""the disappearing"
"to increase economic output. Whilst David Cameron was prime minister, Osborne was widely viewed as a potential future leader of the Conservatives were Cameron to stand down and trigger a leadership contest, despite being seen as a relatively unpopular figure with the general public. Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi suggested that the closeness of his relationship with Cameron meant the two effectively shared power in the 2010–16 government, whilst commentators pointed to Osborne's hand in Cabinet reshuffles. He worked hard on rebuilding his image after the much-criticised 2012 budget. Michael Deacon of ""The Daily Telegraph"" has described Osborne as ""the prince"
"firms. Between May 2015 and July 2016 Halfon served as Minister without Portfolio (attending Cabinet) and Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party. From July 2016 he was Minister of State at the Department for Education, before being unexpectedly dismissed on 12 June 2017 by the Prime Minister Theresa May. In January 2017, Halfon's former assistant, Maria Strizzolo was recorded being wined-and-dined by former Israeli Embassy staffer Shai Masot. Masot was recorded suggesting to her that he should like to ""take down"" Halfon. Al Jazeera, the media outlet which conducted the sting operation, was reported to Ofcom in January 2017. After"
"of HM Treasury, meaning he was a government minister and a government whip at the same time, which the BBC said had led to ""political pundits and opposition politicians scratching their heads"". Labour's Owen Smith, whose parliamentary career has mirrored that of Crabb, called the arrangement ""highly unusual and unsatisfactory"", adding, ""it's unheard of to have a whip also acting as a minister in a department"". At the Wales Office, Crabb worked on maintaining the competitiveness of Wales' energy-intensive industries in the face of high energy costs. In the 2014 Spring Budget, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced that the"
"with ministers if they proposed changing the rather ""blunt instrument"" of fares regulation so that it allowed the operator more freedom to effectively manage demand during exceptionally busy periods, such as sporting events. The same day minority VTEC shareholder, Richard Branson also tweeted an image of and link to the CCTV footage, with the message ""Mr Corbyn & team walked past empty unreserved seats then filmed claim train was ‘ram-packed"". However, many of these seats were subsequently revealed to be occupied when the entire footage was released months later. With Corbyn's account of events now being questioned, the incident began"
"the people you go to organise the hotels and travel and the office holder, the ministers - in this case John O'Donoghue - would have little control over where he stays. Ahern also used a promotional television appearance on ""The Late Late Show"" on RTÉ One to defend O'Donoghue, claiming he had been ""dumped on"". Irish Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan Jnr criticised the forceful nature of O'Donoghue's resignation, claiming he had not been allowed to explain himself. Irish Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism Martin Cullen accused the media of having ""extremely distorted"" the expenses claims. He criticised what"
"older Brexit voters were driven by nostalgia were met with negative reactions from the likes of broadcaster Julia Hartley Brewer, government Cabinet member Sajid Javid, and others. However, some in the media have expressed agreement with Cable's position on Brexit. Other policy, such as punitive taxation of foreign housing investors was criticised in ""Forbes"" and by the Adam Smith Institute think tank, ""Forbes"" describing Cable's proposed policy as being a cure ""worse than the economic disease it's designed to solve."" The ""Financial Times"" considered Cable to be part of a ""coalition of anti-capitalists"" due to his calls for foreign takeovers"
"Times"" reported that Duddridge, who was Africa minister until 2016, was being paid £3,300 for eight hours' work a month as a consultant for Brand Communications on top of his MP's salary. The newspaper reported that this had led to renewed calls to review the rules surrounding jobs for former members of government. It was reported that he was working for Brand Communications and that the company was one of a handful that had not agreed to the industry’s code of conduct that bans hiring sitting MPs. Duddridge told ""The Times"": ""The work I do involves helping companies going into"
"in their own right. Douglas Hogg Douglas Martin Hogg, 3rd Viscount Hailsham, (born 5 February 1945) is a British politician and barrister. A member of the Conservative Party he served in the Cabinet as Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food from 1995 to 1997, and was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1979 to 2010. ""The Daily Telegraph"" in 2009 exposed Hogg for claiming upwards of £2,000 of taxpayers' money so-called for the purposes of ""cleaning the moat"" of his country estate, Kettlethorpe Hall; thus he became one of the most prominent illustrations used by the media to portray the"
"news media. A number of reporters demanded - without success - to know who came up with it. The opposition claimed that the incumbents' strategy was to disassociate themselves from their first 10 years in office, noting the use of phrases like ""more to do"" and the strong focus on Iemma's, rather than the party's, branding. ""Morris Iemma's trying to pretend that he's Rip Van Winkel,"" deputy Liberal leader Barry O'Farrell said. ""That he woke up and found himself in government 18 months ago - the public don't buy it."" Some of Labor's television campaign had Iemma explaining aspects of"
"Shadow DEFRA team as the Minister for Food, Farming and Rural Affairs. He resigned on 29 June 2016, saying that Jeremy Corbyn did not have the leadership skills needed. After the resulting Labour Leadership Campaign in 2016, Nick was appointed as an Opposition Whip. Smith's recent campaigns have included attacking the interest rates poor families are charged by the rent-to-own sector for buying household appliances. He accused companies of charging ""staggering"" interest rates for goods such as fridges and washing machines.. The Financial Conduct Authority announced in May 2018 they are considering a cap on the sector, a move Mr"
"offered those vacated seats by a member of train staff. It also reasserted the claim that Corbyn's policy of bringing the trains back into public ownership was so popular was precisely because passengers across Britain will have been in similar situations on overcrowded, expensive, trains. Corbyn's aide Emma Rees also stated that what the CCTV did not necessarily show was that seats were being reserved by luggage or small children. The filmmaker also stated some of the empty seats appeared to be occupied due to the presence of bags and coats. On 24 August, when questioned about the incident at"
"incumbent Prime Minister John Major for the Referendum Party. Bellamy credits this campaign with the decline in his career as a popular celebrity and television personality, stating in 2002: ""In some ways it was probably the most stupid thing I ever did because I'm sure that if I have been banned from television, that's why. I used to be on ""Blue Peter"" and all those things, regularly, and it all, pffffft, stopped."" He is a prominent campaigner against the construction of wind farms in undeveloped areas. This is despite appearing very enthusiastic about wind power in the educational video ""Power"
"Minister despite losing his department in 2006. He was criticised for visiting the American billionaire Phil Anschutz who was bidding for the government licence to build a super casino in the UK, and questioned over his involvement in the business of his son Johnathan Prescott. He was photographed playing croquet at his then ""grace and favour"" home Dorneywood when Tony Blair was out of the country on a visit to Washington. Prescott was mocked in the media – in part because the game was so divorced from his working-class roots – and he gave up the use of the house."
"to resign, while his colleague Steve Gibbons called Rudd a ""psychopath with a giant ego"". Amidst the controversy, an expletive laden video of out-takes of an intemperate Kevin Rudd attempting to record a Chinese language message during his time as Prime Minister was released anonymously on YouTube, apparently aimed at discrediting his push for the leadership. While Rudd said publicly only that he was ""happy as foreign minister"", media commentators widely declared that a leadership challenge was ""on"" and Independent MP Andrew Wilkie told journalists that Rudd had met with him in November and discussed the leadership issue. Rudd announced"
"the country. There has been a wide variety of both praise and criticism of the film from politicians. Former Conservative Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith referred to the film as unfair, aiming particular criticism at its portrayal of Jobcentre staff, saying: ""This idea that everybody is out to crunch you, I think it has really hurt Jobcentre staff who don't see themselves as that."" Producer Rebecca O'Brien responded by stating that Duncan Smith ""is living in cloud cuckoo land."" Similarly, on an episode of BBC's topical debate programme ""Question Time"" broadcast on 27 October 2016, which featured Ken"
"believed it would allow Griffin to claim 'victimisation'. However, according to ""The Times"", the BBC was 'delighted' with the strategy, which was to ensure it could not be accused of giving Griffin an ""easy ride"". The Welsh Secretary, Peter Hain, who had appealed to the BBC Trust to have Griffin's appearance prevented, continued to denounce the decision. David Lammy, one of Britain's first black ministers, feared that people would face violence as a result of the programme. The former Home Secretary, David Blunkett, attacked the way in which ""BBC News at Six"" engaged in ""deliberate promotion of their own publicity-seeking"
"Dimmock v Secretary of State for Education and Skills Dimmock v Secretary of State for Education and Skills was a case heard in September–October 2007 in the High Court of Justice of England and Wales, concerning the permissibility of the government providing Al Gore's climate change documentary ""An Inconvenient Truth"" to English state schools as a teaching aid. The case was brought by Stewart Dimmock, a lorry (HGV) driver and school governor from Kent, England, a father of two sons who attend a state school. Dimmock has twice stood as a local election candidate for the New Party and received"
"this, the Conservatives posted a slightly modified version of the image with the words ""Fire up the Quattro. It's time for Change. Vote for Change. Vote Conservative."" Subsequently, Kudos Productions—which owns the copyright to the Gene Hunt character—wrote to both parties requiring them to cease using the image. Philip Glenister was introduced to David Cameron, now UK Prime Minister, at the 2009 Police Bravery Awards. Glennister later quipped 'Six months later, he's (Cameron) on Radio 5 Live saying exactly what I've just said. B*****d nicked my line!"" Glenister appeared in the 2012 stage play ""This House"" playing Labour Chief Whip"
"success on this. He was shifted in 1998 to Minister for the Cabinet Office and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. The media dubbed him ""cabinet enforcer"", claiming that his role was effectively to sell the Government and its policies to the public and the media. He also led the government's work on modernising government, and chaired the Ministerial Committee on genetically modified foods and crops. He retired from the Cabinet in 1999, and returned to the backbenches. He stood down from Parliament at the 2005 general election. Having represented the parliamentary constituency that includes Sellafield, the UK's largest nuclear"
"for Energy, and Minister of State for Portsmouth. On 27 July he announced protection from fracking for National Parks—seen as a method of reducing anger in Conservative constituencies ahead of the election. Interviewed on the Radio 4 ""Today"" programme, he rejected the suggestion that fracking was highly unpopular but when challenged was unable to name a single village which supported it. In his role as Minister of State for Energy, he was criticised for hiring a private jet to fly back from a climate conference and accepting money from climate change denial organisation Global Warming Policy Foundation. In October 2014,"