The story starts...
A former senior manager at Ken Livingstone’s London Development Agency has dramatically broken her silence to reveal what she describes as demands for hush money, political interference and financial irregularity that dogged one of the Mayor’s flagship programmes. Brenda Stern, programme manager for the LDA’s Diversity Works initiative, was forced out of her £75,000 job after resisting attempts to funnel £250,000 in LDA money to a personal friend of the Mayor’s senior aide, Lee Jasper, despite a record of deceit and non-delivery. Leaked emails show that the final decision on Ms Stern’s fate was taken not by anyone in the LDA – but by Mr Jasper himself. The supposed reason for Ms Stern’s dismissal was later admitted by the LDA chief executive, Manny Lewis, to be “not founded.” Today Ms Stern says key procedures to protect public money were not followed, “constant interference” by Mr Jasper derailed the programme and the LDA was pressured to pay “hush money” to prevent the details of the scandal being exposed. Ms Stern decided to speak out after the Mayor claimed the Standard’s story last week revealing the scandal of a company called Diversity International, part of Diversity Works, was “entirely false,” “dirty,” and “mendacious” and called for the reporter responsible to be sacked. She said: “I ran the programme and the contract described in the
Standard story last week. I can confirm that everything the Standard reported about that programme and that contract was correct. “I cannot understand why the Mayor is denying the truth. Either he is lying to us or he is himself being lied to.
Read the full story HERE. Guido has analysed the implications HERE.
UPDATE: The First Post reports that Livingstone & Jasper are to sue the Evening Standard.
18 comments:
I for one won't believe that Ken Livingstone and Lee Jasper are guilty until Chris Paul pops over to defend them.
Have a merry Xmas from Webjam! http://www.webjam.com/jamesmawilliams/merryxmas/
[yawn] - if you are going to cover 'local assembly' issues, I hope you are going to be giving coverage to the shenanigans in Cardiff Bay, Stormont and Holyrood House ?
Seems a little strange, then, that Ms Stern didn't take Red Ken to an Employment Tribunal at the time.
It's very unhealthy that Livingstone's immediate reaction is to put up a whole barrage of accusation and (provable) untruth via his 70 or so PR people. He has resisted all calls for independent audit, saying that a proper audit trail exists, which implies that he is aware of a prior (internal) investigation. That is patently not so. Even if it were to exist, his simplest move would be to publish the detail - but he either will not or cannot.
Clearly he has much to hide and does not under any circumstances want to be open to public scrutiny.
Why is this? A democratically elected Mayor refuses to allow investigation? Time to call in the cops.
Apparently Brenda Stern is Jewish, which may explain why Jasper and Leninslime hate her so much.
You'll like this!
http://kerroncross.blogspot.com/2007/12/do-lib-dem-mps-exist.html
Whether Lib Dem MPs actually exist is a deep philosophical question isn't it. ;-)
@ I spy strangers
Stern was seconded to the LDA not employed by it. When she pissed them off by her untimely display of whiteness, Jewishness and integrity, Jasper sent her back.
Leninslime needs Jasper to deliver the black vote. Jasper can appeal to black homophobia and anti-semitism for him.
It's been reported that Ken and Lee Jasper are to sue the Standard and Gilligan for libel.
It's going nuclear.
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Ken Livingstone is rotten to the core.
Livingston is a sleaze. He likes to hit on attractive women who make the mistake of sharing a cab with him. (No! Not Me!!) It wouldn't be hard for Jasper to have "something on him".
It's going nuclear.
No, it's going into the long grass until after the mayoral election.
I would imagine that the decent and honest cohort of black voters would find Jasper as much of an extreme embarrassment as the decent and honest cohort of Jewish voters regard Lord Levy.
Judith,
I don't think anyone except Labour assumes that either of the groups you mention votes or thinks en bloc.
Labour does so because it cannot get past its own prejudices. It considers all blacks, Asians, gays, etc. to be basically the same as each other, rather than viewing them as individuals, as a Conservative would.
This libel ploy is typical Labour - if you don't like your critics' arguments, especially those you know to be true, silence them by threats.
Try posting criticism of Labour on Labourhome and see how long you last. I've lasted less than 24 hours after being subjected to hysterical abuse for daring to question the orthodoxy.
Livingstone and Broon, like all cowards, are frightened men. Both are doomed.
Will the taxpayer be paying for the newt's and his professional chip's legal action? I do hope not. Libel can be an expensive business and it would be very sweet to see this loathsome twosome bankrupted.
Boris should be making capital out of this
WHERE IS HE?
Presumably Ken and Jasper's threat to sue the Standard and Gilligan for libel, is an attempt to kick the issue into the legal long grass during the forthcoming London Mayoral electoral campaign
Thomas Jefferson felt a "revolution" was necessary every twenty years...each generation
I am a young black male in my early 20's. I am disgusted that every time a black man is given a position of power they always seem to abuse it for their own personal profit!
I mean, I have no doubt that when Lee Jasper started out, he probably started for a good cause (as most of them do) but many temptations are dangled in front of our faces as black people trying to help one another! A lot of these so called 100 Great Black Britons are sell outs in this respect. And when I say sell outs I don't mean 'bargainers' as opposed to 'challengers'. I mean they forget about the whole reason why they started and they jump on any agenda given to them by the Establishment! Our young people are wising up! In future it won’t be as easy to discredit positive black people that want to make a difference!
A revolution is starting, no matter what colour, creed or religion you are, you know what is morally right and wrong! You know that for things to get better there needs to be a change!
The conservatives know a revolution is coming.
As politically insulated as many of our youth are these days, the sheer volume and magnitude of mistakes and failures of the Conservative Party have nevertheless become glaringly obvious to most of them, and they can’t help but see how deeply and negatively they’ve been impacted by the Tories agenda.
I don't know whether Lee Jasper is guilty or not, and I don't care because it's too late. If he is guilty, more fool him, and he's exactly the type of person we don't need speaking for us and representing our views.
What I do know is Boris Johnson and a lot of Tories are constantly making racist comments and thus they can in no way fairly represent London of today, maybe back in the 70's/80's where National Front ruled most of Enfield and anyone of an ethnic minority couldn't walk the streets without fearing for their safety, but not today!!!!
I know there is now way Boris can win the mayoral election because if he does there will be chaos much worse than the Brixton riots.
Black communities have been building a strong foundation for race equality and black community civic and political involvement in London and with one swift move the Tories can undo all of this. Racism must not be allowed to drop down the agenda!!! As a society we have come along way but there are still people out there who have a problem with racism and with those who value diversity.
Our government institutions have become mired in corruption. They both collude and are beholden to business interests that place profit above loyalty and ethics. A voter and generational revolution is overdue!
Otherwise a much worse, and likely bloody, revolution will result somewhere down the line!!!
It should be the hope of every generation of British people to conduct their own peaceful revolution, seeking to avoid or forestall the necessity of a violent one!
This is the world today - multi-racial and full of hope for a better future against all odds. In order to solve the many problems, we need a leader who can help us get there. The country has gone downwards, "ruled" over by the same old faces, same old ideas for the last decades. We need hope and new ideas, not Boris Johnson who will recycle the tired Tories agenda!
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