Chris Huhne complaint thrown out


by Tim Fenton    
8:52 pm - July 28th 2011

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With all the noise and space taken up by the continuation of Phonehackgate, the latest numbers on the economy, and the aftermath of the grim news from Norway, one news item has managed to sneak out almost unnoticed.

Moreover, it’s been massaged to make it look other than what it is.

As the heading of this post suggests, the news event follows from the actions of the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his tame gofer Henry Cole, who made a complaint against Chris Huhne.

This was the second attempt by Staines and Cole to pin an election expense irregularity on the Lib Dem MP for Eastleigh, the first having been thrown out at the end of May.

Second time round, though, the Fawkes bloggers were sure of their ground, with Cole hectoring Mark Pack “Why are you putting your neck on the line for a politician who in all likelihood will be out the door any minute?”.

Staines added “my tanks are real and we have him firmly in our sights. He won’t survive”, demonstrating an inflated sense of self-worth, and the belief that politicians can be removed merely by throwing dirt at them on his blog.

So, accompanied by the assertion that he and Cole had “been looking into Huhne’s election returns for nearly a year”, this looked a dead cert.

And so it came to pass that the Electoral Commission gave their judgment on the complaint. The Fawkes blog reported the event as an exclusive (it wasn’t), telling “Commisson Order LibDem Expenses Review”.

This was spin on a scale that would shame Malcolm Tucker and Alastair Campbell both. Because what the Electoral Commission had said was that, barring a ten quid under-reporting of website costs and a reminder to Huhne on letter imprints, they had found no fault, concluding that “the Commission do not believe that further action is required”.

The Sunlight Centre complaint had been thrown out.

And thus another glorious failure was chalked up by Staines and Cole. Just how much more of this success can they manage? And how much had they bet and lost this time?

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About the author
Tim is a regular contributor to Liberal Conspiracy. He blogs more frequently at Zelo Street
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Reader comments


1. Jimmy

It’s enough to make you query the accuracy of that website.

2. Eoghan

This is not a complaint specific to this post or even this site but what’s the point of having a comments stream which consists entirely of retweets? I excitedly scrolled down to read the 18 comments, only to find that every one of them was a retweet of either @sunnyhundal or @libcon. It’s an irritating trait, as I say not unique to here.

Aside from that, the post makes an excellent point – Staines is well known for a pretty scattergun approach but he’s really smearing Huhne for all he’s worth here in the hope that something sticks.

3. MatGB

Eoghan, I concur, on the numbers thing–I tend to get here via feed, so it’s not quite so annoying, but seeing “21 comments” when it’s actually 2 comments and 19 retweets is misleading.

I can see the point of showing the twitter links, but as virtually all of them are now simple RTs and very little value added, the signal/noise is too low to read them.

Still, it does give me something to actually comment on other than to thank Tim for the post and roundup then hit ‘subscribe’

4. Leon Wolfson

@1 – Yes, /quite/

2/3 – It’s probably because I don’t believe wordpress doesn’t provide an easy way of differentiating between them (yet another reason I dislike wordpress!)

5. Charles Wheeler

Only in the Westminster Village could Staines & Co.s juvenilia be taken as anything other than prattish. Why keep drawing attention to it. When small boys shout ‘willy’ and ‘bum’ the tried and tested course is to ignore them.


Reactions: Twitter, blogs
  1. Liberal Conspiracy

    Chris Huhne complaint thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  2. Lee Hyde

    Chris Huhne complaint thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  3. Michael Bater

    Chris Huhne complaint thrown out | Liberal Conspiracy http://t.co/7eWIbdW via @libcon

  4. sunny hundal

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  5. MerseyMal

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  6. overhere

    RT @libcon: Chris Huhne complaint thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  7. Lee Griffin

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  8. Stew Wilson

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  9. Martin Veart

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  10. Kelly

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  11. Chris Marshall

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  12. Tom Stubbs

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  13. Steve Jolly

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW

  14. Rich

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  15. Ismail Mulla

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  16. Chris Wiggin

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  17. Luke Richards

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  18. J-P Stacey

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  19. Lee Hyde

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  20. Clive Burgess

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  21. Stephe Meloy

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  22. Trevor Stables

    Hey @guidofawkes and @mrharrycole – you forgot to report your idiotic complaint against Chris Huhne got thrown out http://bit.ly/n2LkIW





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