In this video @RachelReevesMP says she worked at @bankofengland for "the best part of a decade"

She actually spent c4 years there - 1 year was studying at LSE & 18 months was a @UKinUSA secondment
Even if you count the secondment that's 5 years

Why does Reeves keep lying?
🧵

https://twitter.com/RachelReevesMP/status/1606195653968908288

Her own LinkedIn page gives the dates for her time at the Bank of England

uk.linkedin.com/in/rt-hon-rach…

Sep 2000 - 2002 International Economic Analysis division
2002-2003 British Embassy Washington DC, Second Secretary Economic division
2004-2006 Structural Analysis Economic analysis division

Those dates add from Sep 2000 to Dec 2006 total 6 and a quarter years

BUT

A) she spent a year doing a Masters at the LSE - LSE Masters are a year full time. That was 2003-2004. So that was a period when she was not working at the Bank of England. She was studying.

and B) I also don't think you should include a period on secondment at the British Embassy Washington as 'working at the Bank of England' - it's a secondment in a different organisation....

Even if we take a generous view, and count the British Embassy job as working at the bank, her total stint is just over 5 years

It is really not truthful to describe that IN HER OWN WORDS as the best part of a decade

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In this clip @Ed_Miliband says the idea that bills would go down by £300 - a Labour promise before the Election - came from an "independent" set of modelling

🤔

Let's look under the bonnet of that claim

🧵

https://twitter.com/GMB/status/1856240892983623698

The £300 claim came from a self-described "independent, not-for-profit think tank", Ember

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ember-energy.org/latest-insight…

Just listened back to @RachelReevesMP interview on @BBCr4today with @bbcnickrobinson

She made a series of claims which were just untrue 🧵

They are what is known by the technical terms as total and utter balls

bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0… She said “the previous Government covered up and they were dishonest about commitments they had made. They made commitments around social care, about road and rail projects, about 40 new hospitals. They made those commitments. They told departments they could do those things but they did not allocate a single penny of money for it. That was dishonest”

2/

The Chancellor @RachelReevesMP was asked by Jeremy Hunt about the donation she received from Ian Corfield (who she made a civil servant) and specifically whether she declared it to her Permanent Secretary

This is important

Her answer reveals she did not declare it

🧵 As I have set out on TheWhitehallProject (link in bio), Ministers must declare their financial interests in writing to their Permanent Secretary within 14 days of appointment

This is set out in the Ministerial Code

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Yesterday @Keir_Starmer gave a speech about standards in public life

But his ministers are struggling to defend the growing cronyism scandal 👇

Here’s a dozen questions his Government needs to answer

🧵

https://twitter.com/bbcnewsnight/status/1828557561202901060

1) Did Chancellor Rachel Reeves breach the ministerial code by failing to declare that Ian Corfield had donated to her when she asked for him to be appointed as a Civil Servant?

This must be investigated by the Independent Adviser

Keir Starmer has written in the Times about his promise to lead a new Government of service

As @MelanieLatest writes the hypocrisy is “stunning”

Let’s have a quick recap of the current cronyism mess that his Government is in …

🧵 Rachel Reeves the Chancellor is accused of breaking the ministerial code after her department appointed one of her personal donors - Ian Corfield - as a civil servant

She failed to declare the donation to her permanent secretary as required by the ministerial code

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🚨The Chancellor & Donorgate 🚨

It seems @RachelReevesMP has broken the Ministerial Code 🧵

Of course the broadcast media, leftie lawyers & the professional pontificators who used to bang on about collapsing public standards are talking of nothing else

🧐

#OneRuleForThem In 2022 Reeves pompously stood in Parliament & quoted from Foreword to Ministerial Code

“There must be….no misuse of taxpayer money and no actual or perceived conflicts of interest”

Two years later her department has employed as a Director a man who donated £5000 to her

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Interesting @jillongovt is trying to have a go at me & TheWhitehallProject👇

There are various things to take issue with in her blog 🧵

instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/so-cal… It’s odd that, rather than engaging primarily with issues swirling around Civil Service, her blog opens with complaint about me “sounding” off on WhitehallProject about departments removing Non Execs

That story was covered by Times which judged it important enough to print

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One of the strange things about the Brexit debate at the moment is the persistence of certain idées fixes about the PM's Brexit deal & its alternatives which are repeated by critics

Here's a Sunday afternoon mythbusting thread

👇

A) Myth 1 - the deal isn't Brexit

This is often repeated; yet it is simply preposterous

Deal would take us out EU - no commissioner, no MEPs, no compulsory financial contributions (once exit bill settled), no voting rights, basically out EU legal order

It literally is Brexit

B)

A good Brexit deal is within grasp but MPs risk throwing that away in hope that by leaving with no deal, we might be able to improve our position

That's a HUGE brave gamble

It's time we took some deep breaths & went back to look at what's actually on the table

A thread 👇 Theresa May's Brexit deal remains the only actual deal on table

"Managed No Deal" or the Malthouse Compromise or whatever else are just ideas - not anything the EU has agreed to or shown any real interest in

I am yet to meet a single EU or European figure saying otherwise

2/

Something quite important has shifted in last few days

Labour are now more explicitly admitting that they are not seeking real changes to the backstop but to the political declaration on our future relationship (rather than our divorce)

This matters A LOT. Here's why 👇

1/ DUP are so far pretty implacably opposed to Backstop in its current form as my colleague @dcshiels has documented in various ways ( eg 👇)

[Although there seems some nuance between comments by Geoffrey Donaldson vs @eastantrimmp or @NigelDoddsDUP]

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conservativehome.com/platform/2018/…

One of the things about working around politics now (especially on Brexit) is that I have friends on all sides of debate

@NickBoles has put forward a Norway Plus plan to try to deliver referendum result in a divided commons

A thread on why I respect it but think it's flawed 👇 1/ Although I think it's flawed I recognise Nick & Oliver put it forward in a genuine spirit of compromise and not to obfuscate the referendum

(It's depressing how other MPs less committed to Referendum are happy to trash this soft Brexit plan because they want to stop Brexit)

On Tuesday @theresa_may will lose the vote, badly. Then what?

She'll make a statement that night & has 3 sitting days to introduce new motion. There are then 7 days to amend it

Thread on what comes next 👇

Subtitle - Brexit risks being killed by those who claim to ❤️ it most 2/ I don't think that we are close to a majority in favour of a second referendum. Luckily

Jeremy Corbyn remains luke warm & remain-backing Tories such as @NickyMorgan01 @nickherbertmp etc are still opposed

Many Labour MPs are in favour but far from all of them

My @OpenEurope colleague Stephen Booth has taken a look at claims made by former Mi6 head Sir Richard Dearlove & ex-CDS Lord Guthrie

There are reasons to be sceptical about the PM’s Brexit deal, but the ones they raise are both implausible & misplaced

Here's why -

A thread 👇 2/ In the debate on the proposed Brexit deal, the implications for UK security & foreign policy have come a distant second to economic and institutional considerations.

Listening to another excellent Brexitcast. @adamfleming makes the important point that the Political Declaration is signed off at Head of Government/State level. It's locked down and changes are very hard

Sorry Norway-backers/Single Market 2.0ers .@BBCkatyaadler tells us Brussels contact of hers sees our Parliamentary "mayhem as the deaththrows of magical thinking". I'm tempted to LMFAO as - if anything - magical thinking seems to be getting worse from hard-line Remainers & extreme Brexiteers, as well as Labour frontbench

The DUP are right that a Stormont lock wouldn't resolve all concerns about Backstop but it would improve it and should be welcomed as such.

I've set out previously how I think such a mechanism could work, building on the commitment in the December 2017 Joint Report

Thread 👇 2/ In December 2017 both the UK and EU agreed a Joint Report, paragraph 50 of which noted that in the backstop “the United Kingdom will ensure that no new regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, unless...

It's unclear when this piece by Sir Bill Cash is from (Telegraph website a *nightmare* to use so can't find it there) but - although I agree with some parts - it's inaccurate in a couple of key places

Quick thread👇

https://twitter.com/bernardjenkin/status/1081826567335088128?s=21

2/ This bit is specifically wrong

Article 132 no longer says what Cash suggests it says.

Just listened to @steverichards14 say on the Week in Westminster that Labour do have a policy on Brexit.

Eh?

Really?

A thread on Labour’s Brexit mess 👇

1/ Could anyone sum it up Labour's policy in a sentence or two? Do they back leaving EU or not? Are they for ending free movement & leaving Single Market? With fewer than 100 days to go, it’s getting rather late for their position to still be so nebulous, as @JunckerEU might say

2/

I understand why some are pushing an indicative vote but I think it's misguided & messy

The best thing is head off for a Christmas break & encourage MPs to spend the time thinking carefully

Meanwhile reports of the death of May's deal are greatly exaggerated

A thread 👇

1/ It's obvious there are only now three real options -

✖️Leave with No Deal

✖️Leave with May's Deal

✖️Don't Leave

There are special cases of each of these but every possible path falls into one of these three boxes.

2/

By delaying the vote on the Brexit Deal, the Prime Minister has reverted to her favourite political tactic – kicking the can down the road. Her advisers feared that if the vote had been held today, the size of the defeat would have sunk her entire prime ministership.

A thread👇 2/ But at some point the music will have to be faced. There are already, according to @ConHome over 70 Conservative MPs opposed to her deal. So, before the vote is re-introduced, the Government will need to secure meaningful changes. But how?

What can the PM do to clarify the operation of the exit mechanism in the backstop?

I outlined one suggestion in a piece here a few weeks back

theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

THREAD

1/ I also spoke to @rosschawkins on the Today Programme last week about the possibility of using interpretive declarations to the Withdrawal Agreement to clarify what the UK could consider as material breaches of the treaty.

Listen here -

soundcloud.com/open-europe/br…

2/