On the morning Jacqui Smith got good news on her expenses…
Could this affair explode again?
It’s been a bit of an up and downer for former Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, this morning. With minutes of the report on last December’s arrest of Damien Green there’s news that no further action will be taken against her on her expenses.
The investigation into the Green arrest has concluded that the documents that were being handed over to Green “did not contain information which threatened to undermine national security or Government effectiveness” – which was the premise on which the whole investigation was launched.
The material only contained information that were “embarrassment matters” for the Government.
The move against Green prompted a furious response from those who argued that ministers were using the full apparatus of the state to clamp-down on opposition activity. so now we have it and there’s even more embarrassment for the government.
How this will play during a busy news period as parliament resumes is hard to gauge but I can’t help but think that this will come back to bite ministers. As I said at the time it was a stupid decision and someone should have intervened to stop it.
Fortunately for Mr. Brown Jacqui Smith is no longer one of his ministers.