Danczuk Letter Of Support - It Isn’t

The campaign for the rehabilitation of Himself Personally Now being undertaken by Rochdale’s nominally Labour MP Simon Danczuk has turned out not necessarily to his advantage, as his machinations have come to the attention of Private Eye magazine, the result being an article in the latest edition of the mag (#1411)  titled “Danczuk’s Banana Skin”, after the MP’s attack on his Lib Dem predecessor Paul Rowen.

As the Eye points out, Danczuk’s campaign against Rowen, which was over 40p claimed by an intern for a banana, looks a bit rich, now that he is being investigated over his claims for dependent children, the amounts being £2,425 per child per year since 2011. We are potentially looking at the thick end of £50,000 here, alongside which 40p for a banana looks like, well, chicken feed. And it gets worse.

The last part of the Eye piece tells “Last week Rochdale constituency Labour party sent a ‘letter of support’ for Danczuk to Labour’s national executive committee. It called for a ‘fair’ investigation into the ‘sexting’ scandal which led to the MP’s suspension in December for sending ‘horny’ texts to a 17-year-old girl”. Can it get even worse?

It certainly can: “A number of complaints have now been received by the NEC stating that the letter was only signed off by a handful of Danczuk’s cronies, including council leader Richard Farnell, and does not represent the views of the local party at all”. And what is worse still is that those pesky Lib Dems have got hold of a copy of the letter - only to find out that it is not the unqualified expression of support some thought.

This is the text of the letter:

“At the Rochdale Constituency Labour Party's Executive Committee held on Thursday 4 January, your letter regarding the suspension of our Member of Parliament, Simon Danczuk, was read out.

Members went on to express grave concern regarding recent newspaper reports quoting ‘senior Labour Party sources’ that the case was ‘already proved’ and that Mr Danczuk was facing almost certain expulsion from the Party.

Members were extremely anxious regarding these statements. We would like assurances from yourself and the Leader of the Labour Party that Mr Danczuk will receive a fair and proper hearing by the Party in respect of the allegations made against him and that any decision will be based entirely on factual evidence. We seek further assurances that statements made by Mr Danczuk regarding the future direction and leadership of the Party will have no bearing whatsoever on the investigation to be carried out”.

So that’s a request for confirmation of due process, plus a further request that Danczuk’s litany of columns slagging off his own party leadership be somehow forgotten.

And it gets worse yet again: the email trail exposed by Rochdale Lib Dems shows that the letter was drafted on January 7. Richard Farnell then emailed Allen Brett, Danczuk’s agent, telling him “Further to the CLP Executive Committee on Monday I said I would draft the letter for David [Finlay] to send to the General secretary re: the investigation into Simon. Here it is ... it needs sending off quickly”. Brett replied “PERFECT. Let us send ASAP”.

But David Finlay did not circulate the text to the rest of the CLP for another eleven days, explaining “At last Friday's RCLP, it was requested that the letter from RCLP Exe be circulated to all RCLP members. See below … Apologies for any delay, due to difficulties with my internet provider connection”. A big boy no doubt did it and ran away.

When was the letter sent to the NEC, Messrs Farnell, Brett and Finlay?

Small wonder Labour’s NEC has had so many complaints. And on top of that, I have yet worse news not just for Simon Danczuk, but also those in the Rochdale CLP who have stuck by him. A Sunday Newspaper is sitting on yet another expenses shocker for “Rochdale’s MP”, one which has the potential to drag at least one of those CLP members into the mire when it hits the news stands.

Just how many horror stories have to emerge about Simon Danczuk for his most loyal followers to realise that this particular game is up? More on this story very soon.