Report – “Did Levy try to get Blair aide to modify evidence?”

On the day that Populus reports some disastrous polling figures for Labour and Gordon Brown (see previous thread) more information about what’s been going on in the cash for honours inquiry has been printed in the Guardian this morning. This follows the refusal of a judge to grant an injunction against the paper.

According to the lead story detectives are investigating whether Lord Levy urged Ruth Turner to “shape the evidence she gave to Scotland Yard”.

The report, by Patrick Wintour, goes on “Police have been investigating whether Ruth Turner, the prime minister’s director of external relations, was being asked by Lord Levy to modify information that might have been of interest to the inquiry. Officers have been trying to piece together details of a meeting they had last year. Ms Turner gave an account of it to her lawyers and this has been passed to police..It is this legal document and the exchange between Ms Turner and Lord Levy that has been at the heart of the inquiry in recent months, and which prompted the focus to shift from whether there was an effort to sell peerages to whether there has been a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.“

Last night the Metropolitan Police tried to stop the paper publishing the report but the judge refused because printing had already begun. According to BBC News the police are “concerned that publication might undermine their investigation.”

Ruth Turner is the prime minister’s director of external relations and Lord Levy is a key aide who has played a leading part in fundraising for Labour.

Quite where this is all going is hard to say but at least we are getting a clearer idea of what is going on.

Mike Smithson