snowychap Posted October 20, 2017 Share Posted October 20, 2017 Ian Lavery MP Quote MP Ian Lavery received £165,000 from the 10-member trade union he ran. We have learned this from the trade union regulator which has now released a report into Mr Lavery's actions as general secretary of the NUM Northumberland Area. He will now face questions on his record over a number of disputed payments by the union he ran. Mr Lavery, who is the chairman of the Labour Party, denies any wrongdoing. Ian Lavery is a coming power in the land, Jeremy Corbyn's general election joint co-ordinator and chairman of the Labour Party. If the Conservatives fall, he's most likely destined for high office. But, perhaps, for one thing: his refusal to answer a simple question asked by BBC Newsnight last year: "Did you pay off the mortgage?" BBC Newsnight asked him nine times without getting a reply. The answer, it turns out, is no. He didn't pay off his mortgage. The union of which he was general secretary for 18 years, the NUM Northumberland Area, paid it off and paid him much more besides. Last year, both Jeremy Corbyn and the parliamentary watchdog cleared Mr Lavery. He denies any wrongdoing. The reason we know more about Mr Lavery's peculiar mortgage arrangements is because the trade union regulator, the Certification Officer, Gerard Walker, examined the books after investigations by BBC Newsnight and the Sunday Times. Mr Lavery ran the NUM Northumberland Area for 18 years until he stepped down in 2010 to become the MP for Wansbeck. The regulator's findings are available online. The regulator found that that the Northumberland Provident and Benevolent fund had lent Mr Lavery £72,500 to buy a house in 1994. 13 years on, the union Mr Lavery was then running forgave the loan to Mr Lavery. So he was £72,500 the richer. But there's more. He'd been paying into an endowment fund to pay back the capital cost of the house. It had underperformed, but it still paid out £18,000. The regulator found Mr Lavery kept that too. And that's not all. The regulator found that in 2005, Mr Lavery sold a 15% stake in his house to the Union for £36,000. In 2013 the house was worth less, so he bought it back from the union for £27,500 - a notional profit of £8,500. And then there's Mr Lavery's "termination payments", totalling £89,887.83. However, that total is a matter of some dispute between him and the union. The regulator says that neither Mr Lavery nor the union could provide documentary evidence of the process or the decision by which Mr Lavery was made redundant - or why, given he was leaving for a job as an MP, he needed any redundancy payments at all. Adding £89,887 he received for his undocumented redundancy package to the £72,500 for the forgiven house loan to the £18,000 he was gifted from his endowment, that totals £180,387. But, then, it seems Mr Lavery and his old union fell out. The union recently realised it had overpaid Mr Lavery's redundancy by £30,600. The regulator's report shows that the union asked for it back. Mr Lavery disputed £10,600 of it - and said he'd only give them £15,000. When the regulator asked the union why they settled for this, they simply replied that they were mindful of Mr Lavery disputing it and the potential legal costs: "Mr. Lavery was adamant that £15,000 was his final offer, we were left with little choice but to accept." So our running total of dosh from the union to its one-time general secretary is reduced by £15,000 to £165,387. That's a bob or two in anyone's language. ...more on link Trebles all round! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PompeyVillan Posted October 20, 2017 Share Posted October 20, 2017 Sounds dodgy to me. How can milk a union for that sort of money in addition to your agreed rate of pay and claim to be 'for the people'? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted October 20, 2017 Share Posted October 20, 2017 Definitely dodgy - particularly claiming a pay off for getting a new job. What?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tinker Posted October 20, 2017 VT Supporter Share Posted October 20, 2017 Unions.........I was a steward for the aeeu and then amicus. I watched stewards fighting for a foreign trip with the company we worked for. It was reported to the outside official who disagreed with any of the stewards going on the jollie. 6 months later we found out Madison ( the outside official) went on the jolly himself. They take almost £4 a week from about 30000 workers, they do next to nothing for it and have one full time official for the whole industry. Their useful officials are paid for by the companies they stand up against , shop stewards . When they need the outside official he has no interest in siding with the stewards or the members. Unions just give a perception of fairness , the reality is the same corruption we see In all walks of our lives. Rant over Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seat68 Posted October 21, 2017 Share Posted October 21, 2017 Terrible dodginess. I condemn him. I hope the labour party will too. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dAVe80 Posted October 21, 2017 Share Posted October 21, 2017 Spoke to my mate last night, who works for Durham Miners Association, and he told me a few things about Lavery that are very disappointing. Dodgy indeed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted October 21, 2017 Moderator Share Posted October 21, 2017 I’d be pleasantly surprised if anything happened to Lavery. Hes a Corbyn Ally, he’s a friend of the unions.... they’ve know about this for sometime but yet they’ve persisted in pushing him towards certain roles instead of letting him sit on the back benches until it was either cleared up or forgotten. They chose not to take that course of action, speaks volumes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dAVe80 Posted October 21, 2017 Share Posted October 21, 2017 (edited) 33 minutes ago, bickster said: I’d be pleasantly surprised if anything happened to Lavery. Hes a Corbyn Ally, he’s a friend of the unions.... they’ve know about this for sometime but yet they’ve persisted in pushing him towards certain roles instead of letting him sit on the back benches until it was either cleared up or forgotten. They chose not to take that course of action, speaks volumes Despite him not actually breaking any laws (as far as I'm aware), morally he's really let the movement down. I think you're right about any action being taken. He votes the right way, did a fantastic job on the General Election campaign, and is big mates with Jez. It's also disheartening to realise people knew about it too. Apparently after Ed Miliband went, when it was first mooted about getting a left candidate on the ballot for leader, he was considered, but it was ruled out because of the chances of this coming back to bite him on the arse. Edited October 21, 2017 by dAVe80 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 (edited) surprised to see this thread languishing on page 2 what with the current Headlines ... I can only imagine the same lack of interest had it been a Tory MP Edited October 25, 2017 by tonyh29 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr_Pangloss Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 What headlines are these? The ones about how Corbyn destroyed May in PMQs for the second week in a row? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 20 minutes ago, tonyh29 said: surprised to see this thread languishing on page 2 what with the current Headlines ... I can only imagine the same lack of interest had it been a Tory MP Go on to the forums for people with disabilities. Tell them how upset you are with the online persecution of the Tory party. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 I hear Corbyn is going to be guesting on Gogglebox this week, with a surprise celebrity alongside him on the sofa. Leads to the obvious question, what would be the best pairing for some tv gold? My guess is, it'll be a celebrity tory in the interest of balance. Which probably makes it Ann Widdecombe or Laura Kuennsberg or Jon Humphrys or Nick Robinson. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colhint Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 That's 3 in a couple of weeks now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 1 hour ago, Xann said: Go on to the forums for people with disabilities. Tell them how upset you are with the online persecution of the Tory party. as Ah buts go , that's one of the more obscure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 58 minutes ago, chrisp65 said: I hear Corbyn is going to be guesting on Gogglebox this week, with a surprise celebrity alongside him on the sofa. Leads to the obvious question, what would be the best pairing for some tv gold? My guess is, it'll be a celebrity tory in the interest of balance. Which probably makes it Ann Widdecombe or Laura Kuennsberg or Jon Humphrys or Nick Robinson. my guess is it will be Ann Widdecombe .. but in 2 weeks time labour supporters will be in this thread telling us it was Jon Humphrys and that it was on Loose Women not Googlebox and that it was a right wing media campaign that made us think it was Googlebox in the first place Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 Just now, tonyh29 said: as Ah buts go , that's one of the more obscure I think some of the other readers will get it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 1 hour ago, tonyh29 said: surprised to see this thread languishing on page 2 what with the current Headlines ... I can only imagine the same lack of interest had it been a Tory MP Assuming you're talking about Jared O'Mara/Hara/Can't Remembera, what he wrote was definitely pretty terrible. To be fair, though, it was 15 years ago or so and he certainly seems to have changed his views in the meantime, which has to count for something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrentVilla Posted October 25, 2017 Moderator Share Posted October 25, 2017 1 hour ago, chrisp65 said: Leads to the obvious question, what would be the best pairing for some tv gold? Diane Abbott while they watch Countdown. 2 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 52 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: Assuming you're talking about Jared O'Mara/Hara/Can't Remembera, what he wrote was definitely pretty terrible. To be fair, though, it was 15 years ago or so and he certainly seems to have changed his views in the meantime, which has to count for something. If they search historic forum posts, I think that rules me out of becoming an MP! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 39 minutes ago, Xela said: If they search historic forum posts, I think that rules me out of becoming an MP! If we're being completely honest, it would rule out all of us. And it's probably a pretty rare person who hasn't committed some shitty comment or other to cyberspace at some point. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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