Letter from the Parliamentary Commissioner
for Standards to Lady Olga Maitland MP
As you probably know I am, at the request of
the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, conducting
an inquiry into allegations, made principally by The Guardian,
against a number of Members, including yourself.
I am now in a position to set out in formal
terms the complaint made against you by The Guardian.
ALLEGATION MADE BY THE GUARDIAN AGAINST LADY OLGA
MAITLAND MP
1. In April 1992 you were elected to Parliament.
2. On 31 January 1992 and 3 February 1992, you
had received various payments from Ian Greer Associates.
3. On 6 October 1992 you provided an invoice
for consultancy work to Ian Greer Associates in the sum of £3,000.
4. Insofar as the payment in the preceding paragraph
was related to work done, or services provided after your election
to Parliament, you failed to register that payment in the Register
of Interests.
(I attach copies of your Register entries and
relevant correspondence from your Registry file. Please note that
these documents are supplied for your information and assistance,
and they are not to be taken as intended to corroborate or otherwise
the above allegation.) You may be aware that similar allegations
were made in the book Sleaze: the Corruption of Parliament,
published last week. It may be that these allegations will be
further developed and expanded in evidence to the inquiry from
The Guardian or other witnesses, and you may wish to bear
this in mind when producing your statement. I enclose the relevant
extracts from the book.
I would welcome a detailed, written response
to the allegations setting out which are accepted, which are
disputed, and in so far as actions or omissions are accepted by
you as correctly described, providing any explanations which
may assist me in my inquiry.
I do not seek to place any limit on the length
of any written statement which you may wish to submit, but so
that the inquiry can proceed I would appreciate your written
statement as soon as possible, and in any event, by 6 February
1997. If you propose to submit written statements from others
who may assist me in considering your responses to these allegations,
I would also hope that they could be provided to me by the same
date. If there are potential witnesses from whom you have not
been able to obtain written statements, please identify them
(with details as to how they can be contacted) and explain why
their evidence will assist me in investigation of the allegations
set out earlier in this letter.
DOCUMENTS
I would welcome copies of any documents upon
which you may wish to rely.
PROCEDURE
I enclose a copy of the procedure note which
forms the basis for the conduct of my inquiry.
(Sir Gordon Downey)
28 January 1997
Letter from Lady Olga Maitland, MP to
the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards
Re: Guardian allegations I did indeed
submit an invoice to Ian Greer after I had been elected to Parliament,
this was in relation to a payment made by him to me BEFORE I
was elected.
In 1991 he had sought my help to recover a debt
outstanding to him by the Kuwaiti Department of Information.
I intervened on his behalf during December 1991 and January 1992.
Finally on 31 January he sent me a letter to
my home address - the only address I had at the time, not having
been elected - saying that the outstanding monies had come through.
He enclosed a cheque for £2,000. He topped this up with
a second cheque of £1,000 feeling that the final sum reflected
more adequately compensation for my efforts. The payments were
paid by me into my bank account at Childs, I Fleet Street, London
on 4 February and 12 February together with unrelated small amounts
as I was working freelance at the time.
I heard no more on the subject until later in
the year when Mr Greer asked if I would send him an invoice in
relation to the payments to help keep his books in order. His
financial year ends in June, and his accountants had noticed
that he did not have an invoice for the payment to me. Hence the
request to me for an invoice in the sum of £3,000 which
I duly sent.
Bearing in mind that the payments were received
by me BEFORE I was elected to Parliament, as correctly reported
by the book, and the work involved was before I was elected, I
saw no reason to make a declaration to your department.
You will note that neither the book or The
Guardian allege that I received any money which I failed to
declare AFTER I was elected in April 1992.
To assist you, I enclose a copy of the letter
I received from Ian Greer on 31 January together with a copy of
my bank statement and my freelance cash book[61]
recording the payments. You will note they took place just a
few days after I received Mr Greer's letter. I also enclose my
bank statement for the period up to 31 July 1992.
Bearing in mind the fact that I received your
letter on Thursday evening, I only had five working days in order
to get the material together. I am afraid therefore that I would
need more time to obtain from the bank the period covering September
and October. If you require it, I will ask the bank to send the
outstanding statements. You will note that the payments from
my freelance earnings etc., are interspersed with my parliamentary
earnings together with transfers to my Gold Deposit Account which
makes for some confusion. The bank tell me that if you could
indicate any payment you have doubts about, they will retrieve
the details from their microfilm files. This would take seven
working days. I should however point out that no Ian Greer payments
for £3,000 feature in period AFTER I was elected because
I paid his cheques out to me in early February i.e., before the
Election.
I have no doubt that if approached Ian Greer
would confirm the payment arrangements - and the fact that he
asked for the invoice months AFTER I had been paid by him.
I have not carried out any other paid work for
Ian Greer. He never discussed with me anything to do with Yugoslavia.
As the book correctly says I am highly critical of Milosovic.
It would be evident therefore that I would not have wished to
be involved in any effort to put the Serb leader in a favourable
light.
Regarding the Royal Marsden, I campaigned on
its behalf because half the hospital is in Sutton. This was entirely
a constituency matter, although The Royal Marsden engaged Ian
Greer to help them. My role was purely on behalf of the hospital
itself liaising closely with the hospital director Phyllis Cunningham.
I did receive material from IGA when I moved the adjournment
debate on the Royal Marsden. IGA being retained by the Royal
Marsden was expected to assist in just this manner. I received
no payments for this - nor did I seek any payment. The innuendo
in the book that I moved the debate because in the past I had
receive a payment from IGA as detailed above is wholly untrue.
You might wish to discuss this matter with Miss
Cunningham at the Royal Marsden and Mr Greer.
(Lady Olga Maitland)
7 February 1997
Letter from Mr Ian Greer to Lady Olga
Maitland MP
A few moments ago I heard from the Bank that
we had received the Kuwaiti money - I tried to get you on the
telephone, sadly without success. You have played an enormous
part in retrieving the money due to us, and I would like you
to accept the enclosed cheque. I appreciate you may not want to,
but I really insist. I know you are heavily engaged in the run-up
to the Election, but let's get together and, hopefully, celebrate
a victory after it is all over.
With kind regards and again many thanks for
all your efforts - they certainly are not easy people to deal
with.
(Ian B Greer)
31 January 1992
61 Not printed. Back
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