Only this week we have seen the stench of corruption engulf politics and one who was caught out lobbying for two companies in a paid role standing down, not after admitting any wrong doing, but after the public outrage that his mates were attempting to change the rules to save him, a system that they had created to supposedly “independently” scrutinise conduct within the house.
But being in the pay of companies is not a new thing with this lot, as this timely post demonstrates. Indeed, could there be a more toxic union of that involving a well known chemical industry polluter, and the politicians of Westminster; that corruption filled stench of a place in London?
I have already highlighted how this failing company courted the political class and had amongst their workforce political “friends” in high places, even with the disgusting freak Quaker families who gave the phosphorus contaminators their name. John Wilson rubbed shoulders in the commons in the early 20th Century, but this would not be the last boy that they had in a place of prominence. Even Arthur Albright attempted to get a seat in this rat den of vile individuals , but thankfully failed, which I will look at in another post.
This post deals with two Parliamentarians , a Tory and a Labour man who were both on the Albright and Wilson payroll in the late 1980’s/90’s. You could say that this company were covering their backs by having both parties on board, at a time when their empire was coming to an end.
The Daily Mirror of 20th July 1989 exposed Jack Cunningham (Labour) and Alan Haselhurst (Conservative) as both being in a paid role outside of their own political theatre for the Oldbury based polluter.
The excellent piece by Paul Foot shows what hypocrisy these two showed in being showered with doe by one of the worst polluters in the country.
It references another toxic archive that I have looked at HERE, concerning how the terrorists of Albright And Wilson had been found guilty of allowing radioactive dusts to get into the environment at their disastrous Portishead “clean up” decommissioning operation. “This caused untold, perhaps possibly lethal damage to the company’s own workers”
Foot also correctly stated that the reward for shareholders of this vile polluter was paid out two years earlier to their American owner- thus they were profiteering out of this company causing physical damage to their own staff. If you look back however at the very long list I have evidenced on this website about Albright’s toxic archives, including that at Rattlechain lagoon, as well as the delivery of waste to the site, you can see that they were never a responsible operator to start with, and directly lied to their staff about risks, as well as the public.
The piece mentions a direct quote from the Tory representing Saffon Walden- a market town in Essex, with no obvious connection to any Albright and Wilson establishment in its area.
He stated in a debate concerning Motor Vehicles (Air Pollution) a year earlier that “there is a growing need to protect the environment”.
Here is the direct link to his contribution which also revealed that he was an advisor to Johnson Matthey PLC- another speciality chemicals provider in the automotive industry, who had a very dodgy subsidiary Johnson Matthey Bankers . Bailing out these (w)ankers appears to be a very Conservative tradition.
But what was Haselhurst actually doing for Albright and Wilson? We find out a little more some 7 years later in the Saffron Walden Weekly News of 16th May 1996.
Here he bemoans that he was not “spying” for the company in terms of their industrial rivals, as A Sunday Times article had appeared to suggest. His tally of advice has now also grown to National Power. His advice according to him involved giving the companies a heads up on any legislation, which would in reality be legislation that would cost them more and disadvantage them. At what point he may then have acted on their behalf in order to water down said legislation is open to debate. “Explaining Parliamentary procedure” may also have involved him setting up cosy little meetings between executives and prominent legislators.
You can see why people rightly called this out and he appears to have done no favours to himself in the process.
Hazelhurst would later be embroiled in the MP expenses debacle where The Daily Telegraph exposed how he ran up a £12,000 gardening bill care of the thicko taxpayers. Let’s hope he wasn’t using industrial quantities of Monsanto’s Round up- that cancer causing product that Albright and Wilson made a key ingredient for.
MPs’ expenses: Alan Haselhurst’s £12,000 gardening bill (telegraph.co.uk)
As for Cunningham, I have already highlighted articles in the abhorrent Albright World newspaper , which as I have pointed out before set out to dupe and lie to their staff about many issues including exposure to chemicals made and used at the company.
“He told them that Dr Cunningham, who was his Parliamentary Private Secretary during Mr Callaghan’s government, was “constantly preaching about A+W’s virtues and is a very good advertisement for you” 🙁
These were earlier in his career, but the articles below run chronologically after the Daily Mirror piece.
The first comes from The Newcastle Journal, and is dated 3rd October 1989.
Cunningham was Labour’s shadow environment secretary. You could ask what fucking hypocrite of an MP would want to have links to one of the worst polluters in Britain- well over to the MP for Copeland. It again highlights the issues at Portishead, though not the many disasters at Oldbury, as well as activities in his own back yard at Whitehaven, which would have dire consequences for them as we shall see. Cunningham also served for the Sellafield plant in his constituency and was an advisor for British Nuclear Fuels.
The pollution of The Irish Sea issues would be taken up sensationally by Greenpeace who led campaigns to highlight the abysmal Albright and Wilson pollution from Whitehaven. This rocked the company , and their pathetic lamentations and denials at the time cannot have looked very good on an MP who was “advising” them.
The second article again puts Cunningham under pressure and the same newspaper of 10th October 1991 again exposes his links to environmental savages. Greenpeace were clearly putting pressure on this AW agent . Labour voters themselves were not happy with his links to the phosphorus making scumbags and were making that known in internal polling. The guile of the man however claims that his personal efforts had reduced discharge limits due to his “advice”. Oh yeah, what a pile of shite! Did he suggest any ways of stopping birds being poisoned at a certain lagoon in Oldbury where the company in question were depositing toxic waste?
Unfortunately, his seat did not come under threat and his work for this company would end at least officially when Labour won the general election of 1996 and he became Environment Secretary. Both men now sit in the House of Lords after being awarded peerages.
Clearly we can see how dirty polluting businesses get on in life, they just need a little help from their friends in high places.