Profile: Spotlight on the Labour Lords
By Laura Miller
Lord Taylor
A Labour peer since 1978, Lord Taylor of Blackburn was described in 2007 as “the primary conduit between the defence industry and New Labour. He has been a highly paid ‘consultant’ to BAE for over a decade”.
On October 29th 2008 he “humbly” apologised to the House of Lords during exchanges on winter energy supplies for forgetting his interests: “I asked a supplementary question about gas storage. On reflection, I should have declared an interest, which appears in the register of non-parliamentary interests, in a company called Canatxx Energy Ventures Limited.”
Lord Snape
Labour MP for West Bromwich East until 2001, on November 18th 2008 Baron Snape was forced to apologise to the House of Lords for, “not declaring an interest in my earlier intervention today, although I have done so on previous occasions during the passage of the [local transport] bill. I am employed as a consultant to FirstGroup plc [a global transport operator running trains and buses in the UK]. I am also a declarable shareholder in the National Express Group, although given the state of the stock exchange I perhaps will not have to make that declaration for too many more years.”
In April last year the Taxpayers’ Alliance reported that the former railwayman and MP ‘rushed to the defence of speaker Michael Martin, calling the inquiry into his wife’s £4,000 taxi bill a “load of fuss and nonsense about nothing”.
Lord Moonie
Lord Moonie was fast-tracked by government appointments watchdog the advisory committee on business appointments to work with Sovereign Strategy, a Labour donating lobbying company which ignores a voluntary code of conduct not to pay or employ politicians.
He became an associate director and consultant for the lobbying company in December 2004, having stood down as defence minister in July 2003. He said at the time: “My job will be to teach clients how to lobby government, not to lobby government for clients.”
A relatively new addition to the Lords – he only became a peer in 2005 – Lord Moonie has never forgotten to mention his interests when debating amendments.
Lord Truscott
Baron Peter Derek Truscott is former Russian president Vladimir Putin’s biographer. He is a prolific author on Russia, defence and energy, and works with companies in the business of non-renewable resource extraction.
The Hansard records show that on October 10th 2008 the petroleum and mining consultant declared in the Lords, “relevant energy and other interests, as stated in the Lords’ Register of Interests and recorded by the advisory committee on business appointments.” Lord Truscott was involved in drawing up the 2007 energy white paper.
His voting record shows he has voted “very strongly” against laws to stop climate change.
