Thread by @OwenThompson

I’m glad @theSNP MPs are using today’s opposition day to once again hold the Gov to account on #CronyContracts.

I used my speech to call for more scrutiny to protect the foundations of our democracy.

Thread 👇

@theSNP For as long as this cronyism continues, I’ll keep pushing the Government to take action to ensure this never happens again. They could have done so with my Ministerial Interests (Emergency Powers) Bill, but they never adopted it. #CronyBill

You can have a look at some examples of the chumocracy at work here:

https://twitter.com/OwenThompson/status/1354440677828997122?s=20

And since then, many more examples have come out the woodwork – notably, questions around the hiring of Matt Hancock’s aide Gina Coladangelo, and the decisions to declare many of these contracts unlawful in court:

news.sky.com/story/covid-19…

The Government are evidently rattled by the litigation against them, with attacks stepping up on the @GoodLawProject and founder @JolyonMaugham, who have brought many of these contracts to court

goodlawproject.org/news/bully-cri…

There are too many serious allegations of cronyism coming out for this to be brushed aside or written off as coincidence. Transparency International UK has so far found contracts worth over 3.7billion - one in five between February and November 2020 - which raised red flags.

There must always be time for proper scrutiny of money spent from the public purse and the government must answer for their decisions – yet we still don’t know whether the VIP channels are still operating, who knew about them & who was on them.

Standards in public life are the foundations on which our democracy is built. We need the systems to root out anyone in public office who puts profit over public good. If this is ignored, corruption will fester.