Dear All
When a person enters public life we expect certain standards, the Nolan Principles but we also expect that they in themselves have values.
We don’t get upset about people making a mistake because people get careless and on occasion a bit stupid.
Ian Clement, who served Boris Johnson as a deputy mayor of London has been charged with fraud.
This is in relation to the misuse of expenses using a corporate credit card.
Ian Clements resigned from his £127,000-a-year post in June 2009, for a person earning so much from the taxpayer this looks like greed.
Clement has been accused of five offences under the Fraud Act; multiple frauds are a serious matter.
What is particularly embarrassing for Boris Johnson is that one of his priorities was to stamp out abuse such as this which dogged former mayor Ken Livingstone’s administration.
What will go against Clement's at his trial is that he has had a prior reprimand for his use of the corporate credit card. One would think that this should have gotten through to him to clean up his act.
However more serious allegations have come to light about Clement's credit card use and Boris Johnson accepted his resignation. It was at that point the Greater London authority called in Metropolitan police.
Ian Clement's solicitor has issued this statement;
“Mr. Clement is surprised and saddened that the CPS should have felt that prosecution was appropriate. He has co-operated fully with the investigation which relates to five meal expense claims which have a total value of £227.00. In the context of other, far more significant, investigations it is a matter of regret that political expediency appears to be present”.
After reading the statement and considering that everything bought would be itemised on his card statement I feel that this matter could have been dealt with internally.
In any crime there has to be a mens rea or guilty mind when the person acts knowing what they are doing is criminally liable.
Actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea, means that "the act does not make a person guilty unless the mind be also guilty".
In this case I would be minded to give him the benefit of the doubt, since the system also appears to be at fault.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
When a person enters public life we expect certain standards, the Nolan Principles but we also expect that they in themselves have values.
We don’t get upset about people making a mistake because people get careless and on occasion a bit stupid.
Ian Clement, who served Boris Johnson as a deputy mayor of London has been charged with fraud.
This is in relation to the misuse of expenses using a corporate credit card.
Ian Clements resigned from his £127,000-a-year post in June 2009, for a person earning so much from the taxpayer this looks like greed.
Clement has been accused of five offences under the Fraud Act; multiple frauds are a serious matter.
What is particularly embarrassing for Boris Johnson is that one of his priorities was to stamp out abuse such as this which dogged former mayor Ken Livingstone’s administration.
What will go against Clement's at his trial is that he has had a prior reprimand for his use of the corporate credit card. One would think that this should have gotten through to him to clean up his act.
However more serious allegations have come to light about Clement's credit card use and Boris Johnson accepted his resignation. It was at that point the Greater London authority called in Metropolitan police.
Ian Clement's solicitor has issued this statement;
“Mr. Clement is surprised and saddened that the CPS should have felt that prosecution was appropriate. He has co-operated fully with the investigation which relates to five meal expense claims which have a total value of £227.00. In the context of other, far more significant, investigations it is a matter of regret that political expediency appears to be present”.
After reading the statement and considering that everything bought would be itemised on his card statement I feel that this matter could have been dealt with internally.
In any crime there has to be a mens rea or guilty mind when the person acts knowing what they are doing is criminally liable.
Actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea, means that "the act does not make a person guilty unless the mind be also guilty".
In this case I would be minded to give him the benefit of the doubt, since the system also appears to be at fault.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
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