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Tight-lipped Mandelson calls for transparency
Nicholas Cecil, Chief Political Correspondent27.10.08
LORD Mandelson was accused of hypocrisy today as he came under growing pressure to reveal fully his links with tycoon Oleg Deripaska.
MPs were stunned by a call from the Business Secretary for Russian bankers to show greater transparency in their business dealings.
The former european Union Trade Commissioner is himself facing questions from three capitals - London, Brussels and Moscow - over his relationship with aluminium magnate Mr Deripaska who entertained him on his £80 million yacht off Corfu this summer.
Senior Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker said: "I'm gobsmacked. He seems to have a sense of irony.
"If that's his policy, he can start by publishing his full list of contacts with Oleg Deripaska."
On a four-day visit to Russia, the Cabinet minister warned that there will be no "easy, painless or cheap responses" to the worldwide financial woes.
Stressing that countries need to unite to tackle the economic downturn, he told financiers at a lunch in Moscow: "We need to make sure we are all acting quickly and decisively, but also predictably and transparently." earlier he had met the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and this afternoon he welcomed the signing of a £23 million contract between UK-based company JCB and a Russian civil engineering contractor to buy hundreds of British diggers and generators.
The peer had sought to thrust the "yachtgate" spotlight back on shadow chancellor George Osborne, whose reputation has been hit by the allegation that he had discussed a £50,000 donation to the Tories from Mr Deripaska.
But shadow foreign secretary William Hague called for the peer to make a full disclosure over past talks with the Russian magnate.
"We, and I think the whole country, do want to know, transparently, about the meetings and whether they discussed aluminium tariffs and so on," said Mr hague.
"This drip-drip revelation of things gives the impression there's something to hide."
Lord Mandelson has refused to give a detailed account of his meetings with Mr Deripaska whose company, Rusal, benefited from a decision to relax aluminium tariffs in January 2006 which was taken when the peer was EU Trade Commissioner.
Initially, European Commission officials suggested the peer had first met the Russian in 2006, but after a report that the two had been spotted in a Moscow restaurant in 2004, Lord Mandelson admitted at the weekend that they had met that year.
Mr Deripaska is no longer due to attend a reception at the British Embassy in Moscow but Lord Mandelson will give an interview tomorrow on Russian radio and listeners are already sending in awkward questions.
Defiantly, Lord Mandelson also insisted he is ready to meet Mr Deripaska again despite concerns, which he refutes, that he risked a conflict of interest with his earlier talks with the billionaire.
Reader views (16)
Brown the Clown bringing back this decietful, lying, totaly dishonourable person back into Government shows that the man is delusional beyond belief and as such has proved beyond doubt that he is unfit for the office of Prime Minister. This man has no morals and no honour and has proven twice before he is unfit for ANY position in Government. How the British public have tolerated the fact is beyond me and reminds me of why I left the sinking ship that is the UK
- Duncan Walker, Ex Peckham now Samui Thailand
Beatriz scores, though only up to a point, if I may respectfully say so, Lord Copper.
Osborne--as in osubborned--is true to his class: "before all, cash stuffed in my rear pocket." You expect no better of the likes of him and that is what you get. (Remember, e.g., Jonathan Aitken?)
Mandy, it goes without saying, obtains money less in dodgy but in doggy deals.
Blairs, Kinnocks and their fine ilk--such as, over here, the Martin Luther King tribe--profess a pious regard for poverty yet worship, as Beatriz more or less states, silk shot with gold.
- Charles Harley, Walla Walla, USA
It is just not good enough to see a Cabinet Minister ducking and diving when being asked straightforward questions. That happened today when Lord Mandelson refused to give straight answers to straight questions. This politician is humiliating our country and should resign or be sacked.
- Simon, London
Why is that travesty back in government?! Mr. Bean Brown is enough for for me!!
- Jacqueline, Hampstead, London
Peter Mandelson has more talent than the entire Opposition Front Bench. This is a time when this country (and the world) desperately needs all the talent it can get. Any money that Peter Mandelson makes in an official capacity is trivial when compared with what he would receive in the 'private sector.'
If these Tory half-wits, whose 'deregulation' and 'privatization' Crony-Capitalist policies are largely responsible for the present financial meltdown, want to do anything useful for the people of this country, they will sit down, shut up and get off Peter Mandelson's case. They can also reflect on this wise adage: that before removing a fence, it is a very good idea to discover why it was put there in the first place. With approaching $100 TRILLION in "toxic assets", leveraged beyond reason, hanging over us like a tsunami, these "Capitalist fundamentalists" are absolutely the LAST people to be lecturing anyone else. Perhaps their rich cronies will give the money back...
Cordially,
Tony Hollick
- Tony Hollick, Bristol, England
What Gordon Brown does not appear to realise is that the decision to appoint Mandelson was not about the latter's ability, but, his credibility. Were Brown the Chairman of a public company, and, he attempted to appoint somebody of Mandelsons character with an equivalent professional record to his board, that would be the end of him career wise. Makes you think what woeful judgement and,lack of ethics our politicians have, and, how detached from the real world they are!
- Kevin Sullivan, Roehampton, London.
Frank, Home Counties, I agree with your comments, except for calling Brown communist.
He and Blair have been in bed with the bankers, financiers and super-rich from the start of their government. Brown is more pro-privatisation that Thatcher was - he still supports PFI, PPP, contracting out and sell-off for public-owned enterprises - including the NHS - and pays billions to private consultants for advice that usually benefits the privileged.
The taxpayers have paid out billions that don't benefit most of them, right up to the recent massive bank bail-outs, yet how much will be given back to the low-paid workers or the pensioners to help them through the recession?
- Stan, Derby, England
Osborne is guilty of an error of judgement, but he has never pretended to be a socialist. He comes from a rich family and that is that. Mandelson, Blairs, Kinnocks, etc., would have us believe they care about poor people, but they love to live in luxury and among the rich. They would like to make poverty history by spending our money, not theirs. How come Mandelson can afford a luxury house now when a few years ago he had to borrow money (in a dodgy deal) to buy a flat in Notting Hill?
The EU gravy must be thicker than we thought.
- Beatriz, London
Lord Archer,Lord Mandelson, ring any bells? All as bad as each other regardless of political colour
- Selwyn Channon, epsom
It will be a cold day in hell before I'd ever refer to this appalling man as 'lord' anything. He's not back 5 minutes and he's up to his neck in it again.
Go back where you came from Mandy, we're sick of you.
- Mel Andersson, Tenerife Canary Islands.
I thought the House of Lords was to be abolished? They certainly have a rat infestation.
Brown hired him, if he thought it was going to be a positive for Labour how wrong he was. Bring on the general election now, before Brown and his communist buddies throw more of our money down the proverbial urinal.
- Frank, Home Counties, England
You can always tell when Many is lying, his lips move.
- N Grinsell, London
Whatever he reveals you can bet it will be a distant relative of the truth.This man does not know the meaning of the word.
- C Adams, pont l abbé france.
I could never vote for a prime minister who employs mandelson. The man is about power, not serving the people.
- St, London
Well, you have to be impressed with him, don't you? It took only a matter of days of returning for him to be embroiled in a sleazy situation, with him mud slinging and "explaining" himself.
Just like old times!
- Mark, Suffolk
Am I the only one to wince when I see the word "Lord" attached to the front of the word "Mandelson"? Isn't it about time that we changed the name of these appointed stooges in the Upper House?
- William, London
