Lord Levy, Blairs Best Friend, Arrested
The Independent:
Labour’s chief fund-raiser Lord Levy was arrested today in connection with Scotland Yard’s so-called “cash for honours” inquiry. The Metropolitan Police is investigating whether peerages were offered in return for financial support to parties. The force confirmed this afternoon that a man had been arrested today, but would not confirm his identity.
Sources said the man held was Lord Levy.
Mind you, he hasn’t been charged yet, but given His Lordship’s political prominence as Blair’s bagman, tennis partner and personal envoy to the Middle East (look at what good that did) and the Met’s dodgy political position viz Menezes and Met Chief Sir Ian Blair, I can’t see the police risking so high-profile an arrest without sufficient evidence to do so. The PR fallout from a release without charge would be horrendous for them, so I’m hopeful we’ll see the weasel charged.
Lord Levy has long been the financial eminence grise of Tony’s unaccountable sofa government. From the invaluable Red Star Research:
Lord Levy is one of the most important fundraisers for the Labour Party and Tony Blair’s unofficial envoy to the Middle East. He met Blair at a dinner party in 1994 held by Gideon Meir, a senior Israeli diplomat, and became his tennis partner. Levy was in charge of donations to the ‘private trust’ which funded Tony Blair’s office before the 1997 election (which reached ?7 million), and is now the chief fundraiser for the ‘high value’ donors account at the Labour Party, along with his deputy Amanda Delew (who worked with him at Jewish Care). He is reported to have raised ?12 million for the ‘high value’ fund before the 1997 election, becoming known as ‘Mr Cashpoint’. Straight after the election he was given a peerage. He used to work with Dr Henry Drucker, whose company Oxford Philanthropic was brought in by the Labour Party to advise on gaining large corporate donations, but they fell out over Drucker’s description of Labour’s ‘blind trust’ funds as ‘evil’ (the trusts have since all been closed down). At one meeting with Levy in his Totteridge mansion, Levy apologised to Drucker for not offering him a cup of coffee, but explained ‘You’ll have to do without as none of the servants are about and I don’t know how to work the machine myself.’
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This has to be the end for Blair now. Doesn’t it?
UPDATE : The BBC is reporting that the arrest seems to have been a ploy to gain access to documentation and Lord Levy has not been charged. He has been ‘bailed pending future enquiries’, which tends to mean charges may very well be likely at some unspecified future date. It’s a sort of halfway house between arrest and charge.
The fallout from this is going to be massive for Blair. The pessimisically hopeful question above still stands.
UPDATE II: I’m in a real moral dilemma. Is it wrong of me to be rubbing my hands in glee and anticipation at this very public boil-lancing, given the current horrible international situation?
