Annex II
Letter to Mr Geoffrey Robinson MP
from the Parliamentary Commissioner for
Standards
COMPLAINT
RAISED
BY
MR
HEATHCOAT-AMORY
Thank you for your letter of 23 March 2001 and for
speedily providing me with documents relating to the complaints
raised and your explanation of these events. I would be grateful
to receive any further comments you wish to make on Mr Heatcoat-Amory's
allegations, particularly concerning the possibility of misleading
information having been given to my predecessor and the Standards
and Privileges Committee.
I have today received a further letter from Mr Heathcoat-Amory
in which he provides further details to support his complaint
(copy attached). I would also be grateful for your comments on
his second letter.
Please would you also let me have information about
the following:
1) Your recollection of the breakfast meeting
with Mr T Bower at the Grosvenor House Hotel in December 2000
including what was said by yourself and Mr Bower. Do you have
any explanation for the impression Mr Bower appears to have gained
that you had admitted personally to receiving the payment?
2) Your recollection of all the conversations
you had with MrAldous. Please provide all the correspondence you
or your advisers had with the Department of Trade and Industry
enquiry. Please would you make clear whether during his enquiry,
Mr Aldous provided you with new information and, if so, what it
was. I understand that you will have seen a draft copy of the
relevant passages of the Department of Trade and Industry report.
Please supply me with a copy or if you do not now hold one, your
recollections of its contents.
3) Details you have obtained of the Pergamon
AGB's computer cash book record of £200,000 having allegedly
been paid to G. Robinson / Orchards.
4) Details of your conversations with Mr
Stoney about this alleged payment between 14 July 1998 and today.
5) Did Mr Maxwell tell you in December 1990
that you would be paid £200,000?
6) Did you phone Shirley Caddock (Mr Stoney's
secretary) asking for the £200,000 to be paid in to an account
other than Trans Tec? If so, what account did you specify? How
do you account for the note in Mrs Caddock's handwriting on the
copy invoice indicating that you had asked for the cheque to be
paid to you personally?
7) Do you have, or have you ever had, an
account which related in any way to your home Orchards?
8) Did you make any agreement with anyone
about the Department of Trade and Industry enquiry report which
restricted you in any way from including any matters in your memoirs?
9) In 1990, did you ask either Mr Maxwell
senior or Mr Kevin Maxwell for the payment to be paid? If so,
please give details.
10) In his letter of 26 March 2001 Mr Heathcoat-Amory
lists other companies, other accounts and connected trusts into
which the alleged cheque might have been paid. Please would you
let me know whether the cheque in question was paid into any such
account?
11) I would also be grateful for your response
to Mr Heathcoat-Amory's further point on the tax and NIC's implications
of the invoice submitted.
We have already arranged to meet on Friday, 30th
March at 10 a.m. and I hope that the meeting will allow us to
tie up any loose ends. However, you may prefer to move matters
on by replying to this letter in writing and that would be most
helpful. I would be grateful if you would leave the Friday meeting
in your diary so that we can hold the meeting if there are matters
which require further discussion.
Thank you for your assistance with these matters.
26 March 2001
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