Tony Blaire's case.

Com 240
02/27/2007



Tony Blaire’s case.


Last Friday, Tony Blair has been heard one second time by the police force in the case of the illegal financing of the parties which occupies, for a few months, the British political scene. Information was revealed only yesterday, Scotland Yard having claimed up to now the silence of Downing Street for "operational reasons". According to a declaration of the police force, Blair would have been questioned during forty-five minutes in order to "clarify certain points of the investigation. It was questioned in the capacity of witness and not as suspect and cooperated fully ".

The business goes up at last March. The British police learns whereas four businessmen saw themselves proposed "honors" (post offices with the House of Lords or titles of knight) in exchange of secret loans made with the Labour Party. Estimated amount: 4,5 million pounds sterling (approximately 6,9 million euros) advanced to the day before of the general elections of 2005. Admittedly, nothing prohibits in Great Britain the loans deprived with the political parties. Remain that a law of 1925 banishes the delivery of stock honorary in exchange of money.
The advertisement of the interrogation of Tony Blair comes to reinforce the suspicion which weighs already heavily on the shoulders of the Labour Party. Tuesday, Michael Levy, fund raiser of the Ploughing, very near friendly to Blair and her partner with tennis, had been stopped for the second time. According to the police force, it is suspected of "plot in order to make obstruction with justice". It was slackened in bond.

A fate comparable with that of Ruth Turner, one of the advisers of Tony Blair. January 19, the young woman had been stopped at dawn in her residence. Suspected of obstacle to justice, it was slackened a few hours later, in bond it too. Two arrests which prove, according to the press, which the British police force does not have access to all information. "False" answered, at the beginning of week, the services of the Prime Minister, contradicting the rumours according to which compromising courriels and documents would have been dissimulated or destroyed.

In the slides of the political scene, the business makes great noise. The conservatives claim with horn and cry the resignation of Tony Blair. Among them, George Osborne, preserving deputy and chancellor of Shadow Cabinet: "This government is paralysed. It is difficult to include/understand why Tony Blair still remains at her station." On their side, the democratic liberals enjoy to compare this saga like the scandal of Watergate.

The business is highly embarrassing for the Labour Party. The more so as in 1997, the Ploughing had triumphed over the promise to put an end to the reign of Tories marked by the politico-financial scandals. Blair will have to be satisfied with another stone at the historical building: it is the first time, in Great Britain, that a Prime Minister in exercise is questioned within the framework of a criminal investigation.