Like many MPs, Labour's former Europe minister saw the expenses regime as a semi-legitimate way to augment his salary
Denis MacShane, the former Labour minister jailed for fiddling his expenses, last saw the inside of a prison cell in 1982 when he was convicted by a communist court in Warsaw for running money sent by western trade unions to underground activists in the Polish union Solidarity.
This time it is a western court that has found him guilty – again of running money, but this time between the taxpayer and himself, even if he insists it was not for personal profit.
MacShane fought hard to disguise his wrongdoing, and his enemies will say he deserves his sentence. They will see him as no different to the other Labour MPs jailed for similar offences. But his friends will defend him as a man who takes risks and places himself in danger. MacShane was briefly detained by apartheid police in South Africa when working with black trade unions in townships. Then, siphoning money was a shortcut to raise cash for the work he did in Europe.
It is a tribute to the loyalty he engenders that colleagues such as John Monks, the former Trades Union Congress general secretary, and Tom Harris, the Labour MP, spoke so robustly in his defence in court.
Monks said MacShane "was a cutter of corners, but not a venal crook". He told the court: "He reminded me of one of those 50s films about Polish pilots in the RAF during the Battle of Britain – daredevil, cavalier and sometimes foolhardy. A self-centred and greedy crook? No."
Harris alluded to the suffering MacShane has endured in his personal life – the loss of his daughter in a skydiving accident and the death of his first wife, the newsreader Carol Barnes. "Any normal person might have broken down, demanded long leave to sort himself out. Denis just kept going for his constituents, for his government and his party," Harris said.
"Sadly MPs are terrified of the long shadow of expenses and while everyone in private agreed Denis was unjustly treated, and some of us told this to members of the committee on standards to their faces, the plain fact is that an MP on an expenses allegation is without a friend or advocate in the world. A number of us are very concerned now at this relentless destruction of a decent, hardworking MP's life."
The son of a Polish immigrant father and an Irish mother, MacShane had a wide circle of friends across Europe, and was probably happiest as Labour's Europe minister between 2002 and 2005. Few British MPs in the 80s and 90s knew as much about European politics. MacShane often acted as a translator of Europe to British Labour.
MacShane's frontbench career ended when he was fired after the 2005 election. He said he had no idea why this was, but remarks in which he had described Gordon Brown's tests for joining a single currency as a "giant red herring" were thought to have played a part. MacShane initially denied the comments, made to students in Durham, but they were recorded and played back live on TV.
Made a privy counsellor in 2005, he became a UK delegate to the Council of Europe and the Nato parliamentary assembly and went on to chair the inquiry panel of the all-party parliamentary group against antisemitism.
He found the details of MPs' expenses tedious and, like many MPs, saw the loosely policed expenses regime as a semi-legitimate way to augment what he regarded as an inadequate basic salary, taking it to the level of many of his European political friends.
Last month he said he "fully accepted" his error and said this was why "I have been apologising non-stop for four years. I made no personal gain of any sort. What I did was worse than a crime, it was a stupid error. It ended my political life, but I shall continue to combat xenophobia, antisemitism and the manic populism which unless checked will lead Britain out of Europe." Reported by guardian.co.uk 10 hours ago.
Denis MacShane, the former Labour minister jailed for fiddling his expenses, last saw the inside of a prison cell in 1982 when he was convicted by a communist court in Warsaw for running money sent by western trade unions to underground activists in the Polish union Solidarity.
This time it is a western court that has found him guilty – again of running money, but this time between the taxpayer and himself, even if he insists it was not for personal profit.
MacShane fought hard to disguise his wrongdoing, and his enemies will say he deserves his sentence. They will see him as no different to the other Labour MPs jailed for similar offences. But his friends will defend him as a man who takes risks and places himself in danger. MacShane was briefly detained by apartheid police in South Africa when working with black trade unions in townships. Then, siphoning money was a shortcut to raise cash for the work he did in Europe.
It is a tribute to the loyalty he engenders that colleagues such as John Monks, the former Trades Union Congress general secretary, and Tom Harris, the Labour MP, spoke so robustly in his defence in court.
Monks said MacShane "was a cutter of corners, but not a venal crook". He told the court: "He reminded me of one of those 50s films about Polish pilots in the RAF during the Battle of Britain – daredevil, cavalier and sometimes foolhardy. A self-centred and greedy crook? No."
Harris alluded to the suffering MacShane has endured in his personal life – the loss of his daughter in a skydiving accident and the death of his first wife, the newsreader Carol Barnes. "Any normal person might have broken down, demanded long leave to sort himself out. Denis just kept going for his constituents, for his government and his party," Harris said.
"Sadly MPs are terrified of the long shadow of expenses and while everyone in private agreed Denis was unjustly treated, and some of us told this to members of the committee on standards to their faces, the plain fact is that an MP on an expenses allegation is without a friend or advocate in the world. A number of us are very concerned now at this relentless destruction of a decent, hardworking MP's life."
The son of a Polish immigrant father and an Irish mother, MacShane had a wide circle of friends across Europe, and was probably happiest as Labour's Europe minister between 2002 and 2005. Few British MPs in the 80s and 90s knew as much about European politics. MacShane often acted as a translator of Europe to British Labour.
MacShane's frontbench career ended when he was fired after the 2005 election. He said he had no idea why this was, but remarks in which he had described Gordon Brown's tests for joining a single currency as a "giant red herring" were thought to have played a part. MacShane initially denied the comments, made to students in Durham, but they were recorded and played back live on TV.
Made a privy counsellor in 2005, he became a UK delegate to the Council of Europe and the Nato parliamentary assembly and went on to chair the inquiry panel of the all-party parliamentary group against antisemitism.
He found the details of MPs' expenses tedious and, like many MPs, saw the loosely policed expenses regime as a semi-legitimate way to augment what he regarded as an inadequate basic salary, taking it to the level of many of his European political friends.
Last month he said he "fully accepted" his error and said this was why "I have been apologising non-stop for four years. I made no personal gain of any sort. What I did was worse than a crime, it was a stupid error. It ended my political life, but I shall continue to combat xenophobia, antisemitism and the manic populism which unless checked will lead Britain out of Europe." Reported by guardian.co.uk 10 hours ago.