Annex 171
File note by the Parliamentary Commissioner
for Standards
Willie Sullivan
21 March 2000
Telephone call with Willie Sullivan
Willie Sullivan telephoned me having received my
letter. He said he was very anxious about things because "he
believed he would be finished in the Labour Party if he talked
to me". I said I was sure that was not the case that the
Standards and Privileges Committee had a majority of Labour Members
on it and they would be grateful and impressed if he were brave
and informed me of what he knew. He said what worried him was
that it was the Labour majority, because he was sure that anything
he said would leak into the Party.
I explained my procedures to him and that I was currently
getting information from a wide number of people about what had
happened. He said that there were some of the questions that he
had no knowledge of which concerned formal employment arrangements
but that he was party to conversations in the office and indeed
some of the individuals told him what the situation was I asked
him either to write that to me or to have another conversation
with me on the telephone and tell it to me so that I could send
him a note. He said he would write to me with the information
and I thanked him.
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