shameful journalism

3728 days ago

Maria Miller MP – Another Political class expenses Pig, spinning madly and playing the system at our expense

In a shameful piece of journalism, The Daily Mail today carries a piece stating that Culture Secretary Maria Miller is set to be slammed by the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner Kathryn Hudson for fiddling £90,000 of expenses.  Who planted this story? I bet you a fiver it was the spin department of Maria Miller. To a trained journalist it is so obvious that this THIEF is spinning hard, albeit in an incredibly amateurish fashion, to keep her nose in the trough.

The article cites sources, friends of Miller, Tory MPs but makes it clear that it has not been spoken to be team Piggy Miller. The article protests too much.

The substance of the piece is that Hudson has indeed found Miller guilty of fiddling her expenses But…

1. She will not have to pay the money back so this is not really that serious, just a little misunderstanding
2. Many Tory MPs think Ms Hudson does not understand the rules
3. Most Tory MPs are sympathetic to Ms Miller
4. Dave Cameron is desperate to keep as many women on his front bench as possible – given recent accusations of sexism.

Clearly the only person who benefits from this story appearing is Maria Miller in that one is left with the impression that the Watchdog might just be a bit incompetent, that the crime is not really that serious and that if she does get axed from the cabinet it is only because she was a woman and that most MPs are essentially on her side.  As such it is blindingly obvious who planted this story and who all the “sources are”. Shame on the Daily Mail for running such crap.

Looking at the points in order.