Cash for honours: no charges

Last Modified: 20 Jul 2007
By: Gary Gibbon

After a 16-month investigation costing £1m, the Crown Prosecution Service says no-one will be charged in the cash for honours affair.

The affair cast a cloud over the Blair government.

The police have defended their inquiry as "entirely proper", but there was clear relief among those who'd been questioned. The former prime minister Tony Blair said they had been through "a terrible, even traumatic time".

And his former chief fundraiser, Lord Levy, said he was "delighted and relieved" it was all ending without charge.

Lord Levy told friends this was a time for relief not recrimination. But for him these last 16 months have been a nightmare.

Tony Blair's main Labour party fundraiser found himself suspected of selling peerages and was arrested on suspicion of mounting of a cover-up

The police investigation team thought they had enough evidence to charge Ruth Turner, Tony Blair's former number 10 aide, in connection with a cover-up, and Christopher Evans, boss of Merlin Biosciences, who loaned £1m to the Labour party. But the Crown Prosecution Service disagreed.

The head of the police investigation, Assistant Commissioner John Yates, made no apology for what he said had to be a thorough investigation.

The police investigation has given huge impetus to reform of the Lords and party funding.

In France for a summit with President Sarkozy, the prime minister said he hoped today marked the end of the saga. But he conceded that the police had been right to investigate.

The police investigation has given huge impetus to reform of the House of Lords and party funding. The investigation regularly convulsed the political scene, stealing the headlines.

It did harm to some big names in business, who now may never enter these portals. And it contributed to Tony Blair's early departure from Downing Street.

Westminster normally regulates itself. The police do not often cross into the world of politics in this country. One of those questioned by the police said today that they had come into the political world and "trashed the place".

One of those questioned by the police said today the police had come into the political world and 'trashed the place'.

One witness questioned by Assistant Commissioner Yates's team said the police had leaked outrageously throughout the investigation.

A former number 10 aide said Mr Blair felt at the time that the pre-dawn arrest of his aide, Ruth Turner, smacked of intimidation. Mr Blair, like many participants in this episode, was trying to take the heat out of things.

It is understood that Assistant Commissioner Yates believes many in Mr Blair's team showed contempt for the law. In his statement today Mr Yates implied Mr Blair's team had only themselves to blame for the drawn-out nature of the investigation.

The central allegation, way back when the inquiry started, was that Tony Blair and Lord Levy, panicked by the Conservatives, seriously outspending them at the last general election, decided to go below the radar with their funding - to go for secret loans from big business names.

The central allegation was that Tony Blair and Lord Levy decided to go below the radar with their funding - to go for secret loans from big business names.

Four of those secret lenders then turned up within only a few weeks on a list of nominees for the House of Lords: Sir David Garrard, Chai Patel, Sir Gulam Noon, and Barry Townsley.

The police investigation discovered that there had been earlier drafts of the list of proposed new lords that had even more lenders' names on them. Some were dropped, and a number 10 email said that Lord Levy would not be pleased.

But as the Crown Prosecution Service statement issued today states, no "agreement" to exchange money for a peerage could be proved, and each of the businessmen whose name appeared on Tony Blair's recommendations for peerages was "a credible candidate for a peerage". The fact is that there has been a statistically compelling correlation donations and peerages for decades under both Conservative and Labour governments.

Mr Blair's nominees attracted police attention because the timing was so acute: you bail out the Labour party one minute and you're on the Lords list the next. Plus, Mr Blair's secret loans were evading laws on openness that he himself had brought in.