Oh no, it happened in 2007 too and cost him his job at the time, though David Cameron forgave him and gave him a better job!
Category Archives: Hugo Swire
Do you really want to vote for a candidate who is at the “top level of Government and has influence?
One who spends his time with his Big Business buddies all over the world with precious little time for his constituency, who makes tasteless jokes about expensive cars, Greeks and people on benefits at a £15,000 per table fundraiser and who has no idea whatsoever about the devastation being wreaked on East Devon by his government’s planning rules? If so, feel free to vote for this man:
Or you might you vote for someone who refuses to be the mouthpiece for big business, instead promises to support the local small to medium businesses, to fight for and protect the NHS in her area and has a solid record of objecting to the most devastating planning policies that this district has ever seen – Claire Wright.
Here she is drawing crowds at Ottery St Mary, Sidmouth, Budleigh Salterton, canvassing in Eastern Exeter
and there are many more pictures of her at smaller locations and venues on her website, talking to people and basing her Manifesto on what they told her they needed to happen in this district:
See and hear her speak:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ZYXMTm1lgmg#t=0
Meet the Candidates (East Devon PPCs, and for Sidmouth Town and District Council), organised by VGS
Click here for details: VGS hustings poster1.pages
MP voting records
Is your MP a Tory or Lib Dem? Want to know what they’ve been doing in your name for the last five years?
See if they have a parliamentary record worth defending — or one they’d rather you didn’t know…
This is what happened when Hugo Swire’s name was input:
Hugo Swire doesn’t think youthful politicians are a good idea
Question: If you could change one thing about British Politics what would it be?
Hugo Swire’s answer: Make sure that our ageing population also had representatives of their own age and reverse this constant demand for elected politicians to be youthful
http://www.eastdevonconservatives.org/news/spotlight-rt-hon-hugo-swire-mp
Now, who might he be thinking of!
Want an election visit from Hugo Swire? Put up a Claire Wright poster!
News reaches us of an Exmouth resident personally visited by Hugo Swire yesterday. Was it a coincidence that the resident had Claire Wright posters in the window?
The resident informs us that the household vote remains with Claire Wright and the posters stay up!
Neighbourhood plans to the rescue?
Lympstone residents, Hugo Swire, and Ben Bradshaw, discuss this in the Sunday Politics show:
Going, going, gone!
Auctioneering, and electioneering, feature in the latest posts on http://realzorro1.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/independents-vote-in-change-vote-out.html
Hugo Swire’s jokes: not funny
Sunday Politics South West this morning
Soundbites from Hugo Swire
… [yes we should have a secret ballot for Speaker] – why?
“the Speaker has not been favourable to us”!
Hugo thinks the Coalition has been a success
He tried to talk about his own Constituency but the presenter pulled him up – not what they are talking about
Hugo says people should know when they vote what the outcome should be (we wish: no-one mentioned the National Planning Policy Framework and its effect in giving us a developer free-for-all!)
Loves the “Growth Point”
Ben Bradshaw: the Speaker did a good job, he challenged the Government and Bradshaw called Cameron “arrogant and incompetent”.
There was a feature on Lympstone’s Neighbourhood Plan.
Bradshaw in favour of them, local communities must decide but must have mo no absolute veto.
Presumption in favour of development: Hugo says a Local Plan SHOULD (not WILL) stop inappropriate development. Ben Bradshaw pointed out that EDDC has no Local Plan and so is building up to the Exeter boundary whether Exeter likes it or not.
The programme then re-ran Hugo’s stupid joke. “Just a money raising gag”.
Ben Bradshaw said Hugo should realise he could be recorded and his remarks reinforced the view that some MPs are out of touch, the St Ives LibDem prospective candidate agreed with him.
It is on BBC iPlayer and begins about 38 minutes into the programme.
Strange things can happen at a General Election …
Independent on the march
In East Devon the Liberal Democrats are the traditional runners up to the Tory safe seat, but with the slump in their fortunes nationally a local independent politician is making the running at the expense of the retired diplomat Stuart Mole for the LibDems. Claire Wright from West Hill is already a County and District Councillor and has a strong power base in the Ottery St Mary area, but the question is whether she can gain ground in the wider countryside during the campaign. Government Minister Hugo Swire enjoyed a majority of more than 9,000 in the last election so it would be quite a shock if Wright was to have a major impact, although strange things happen in election campaigns.
Hugo Swire is no longer our MP …
Parliament was dissolved today, so please newspapers and local Tories, immediately stop calling him our MP and call him a prospective Parliamentary candidates for East Devon – just like all the others, which is all he now is.
“When Parliament is dissolved, every seat in the House of Commons becomes vacant. All business in the House comes to an end. There are no Members of Parliament. MPs revert to being members of the public and lose privileges associated with being a Member of Parliament.”
MPs are allowed access to Parliament for just a few days in which to remove papers from their offices. The facilities that the House provides for MPs in Westminster during a Parliament are no longer available to them from 5pm on the day of dissolution.
Until a new Parliament is elected, there are no MPs. Those who wish to be MPs again must stand again as candidates for election.”
http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/elections-and-voting/general/dissolution/
Sidmouth Herald on Hugo Swire’s “jokes” and opponents comments
Swire’s benefits gag is no joke to election rivals
Hugo Swire’s election rivals have called on him to apologise after he was secretly filmed joking about welfare claimants at a Tory fundraiser.
The East Devon MP made the comments at the Cabout welfare claimants at a Tory fundraiser.
The East Devon MP made the comments at the Conservative ‘black and white’ fundraising ball last month, which raised millions for their election campaign.
The footage was part of a Channel 4 Dispatches ‘sting’ into election funding screened on Monday.
Before a wealthy audience, Mr Swire, a former Sotheby’s director, led an auction at the Grosvenor House hotel in Mayfair.
Mr Swire was trying to persuade wealthy donors to bid more, and at one point said: “£60,000 … Ian, persuade him … He’s not on benefits is he? Well if he is, then he can afford it … £55,000?”
Mr Swire told the Journal this week: “This was an off-the-cuff dig to raise money for the party. It was not an attack on the welfare state.”
East Devon’s Labour candidate, Steve Race, said: “These comments show just how out of touch he, and this government, is. I’ve been to a food bank, one of three operating in East Devon, and I know that poverty is no laughing matter.
“Ordinary people talk to me about the struggles they have to pay the bills.
“We need real solutions not these callous comments from an MP who thinks poverty is worthy of a cheap joke at a fundraiser with his millionaire pals. I hope Hugo Swire does the decent thing and issues a public apology”
Liberal Democrat candidate Stuart Mole said: “I was appalled by the sight of a wealthy Conservative minister mocking people on benefits at an exclusive Mayfair ball.
“He insults some of his most vulnerable constituents and shows the disconnect between some politicians and the people they seek to represent. I think he should apologise.”
Independent candidate Claire Wright said: “What is funny about people who face a daily battle trying to survive on benefits?
“It is not funny for those who struggle to scrape together the funds in an attempt to make ends meet.
“It shows him in a poor and callous light. His comments reflect a worrying lack of compassion that characterises this government. Mr Swire should apologise for his crass remarks.”
UKIP candidate Andrew Chapman said the comments were in ‘extremely poor taste’.
He added: “Mr Swire’s joke, albeit in private company, shows just how little people in the ‘Westminster bubble’ understand about the realities of life in the UK.”
East Devon? Where’s that?
Our local, current MP has used one of his final columns of this Parliament to extol the virtues of George Osborne saying he knows him ” pretty well”.
His ONE mention of the South West (not East Devon) is to say that Help to Buy ISAs could help 95,000 people to buy their first homes. (Surely not all of them in East Devon but you can’t be sure of anything about “economic growth” in East Devon these days!).
IT WILL NOT HELP IF OUR YOUNG PEOPLE DON’T HAVE JOBS AND CAN’T GET AFFORDABLE HOUSING!
Whilst general unemployment has dropped (thanks in large part to tax credits and part-time zero hours contracts favouring employers rather than employees) youth unemployment stubbornly refused to fall.
Still, Cranbrook, phases 1-100 will benefit local developers.
Get angry, get even on 7 May 2015 says Real Zorro on relocation
http://realzorro1.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/rip-knowle-get-angry-get-even-vote-7-may.html
Not to mention a post on comparing our current MP, Hugo Swire, to Mr Bean!
http://realzorro1.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/more-press-coverage-for-hugo-swire-aka.html
Hugo Swire hospitalty benefits
In case you miss a comment posted below, it is repeated here:
In Hugo Swire’s Register of Interests, you can see that he, and his wife whom he employs at our expense, has declared benefits in the form of free tickets to several Black and White Balls paid for by IPLG Ltd. IPLG Ltd is connected to Michael Spencer.
A report dated June 2011,Conservative Party Interests Relating to the Insurance Industry* says this of Mr Swire and other IPLG beneficiaries:
IPGL – IPGL is a private holding company controlled by businessman Michael Spencer and it appears several times in this report. Among a diverse and changing investment portfolio it wholly owns the insurance company Insurance Capital Partners and partly owns an insurance brokerage called Oxygen.
Since 2005 IPGL and Micheal Spencer’s donations to the Central Conservative Party and constituencies have totaled £3,929,892.52. IPGL has also given
hospitality in the form of private helicopter and plane journeys,international visits and tickets to Conservative Party social functions to several Members of Parliament since 2007. The following Members of Parliament have received such hospitality:
MP David Cameron
MP Mark Francis
MP Andrew Mitchell
MP George Osborne
MP Hugo Swire
Mr Spencer’s other financial interests are reported to have included a spread betting concern. Wonder what odds they are giving Hugo now?
*leftfootforward.org
Hugo “foot in mouth” Swire makes it into today’s London Evening Standard
“The only blessing was that this offered distraction from the truly toxic Afzal Amin, who may well have cost the Tories a crucial seat in the Midlands after he was accused of a deal with the far-Right English Defence League so improbable, stupid and cynical that it sounded like the plot of a satirical television drama.
Lest we think this was just idiocy from a rookie newcomer to politics, consider Hugo Swire, a Cameron ally and Brahmin of a banking dynasty. Representing a party which has to conduct difficult welfare reforms while being accused of being led by heartless toffs, he made jokes about people on benefits being able to afford £60,000 in auction prizes at a fundraiser. Swire is also a minister of state — a Cameron appointment — so the task of diplomacy without shooting his foot should not be entirely beyond him.”
Hugo Swire declines to explain himself on BBC Spotlight
Good report on BBC Spotligh which did not show Hugo Swire in a good light, making much of his well-to-do background. Surprise, surprise, he declined an interview with them!
There then followed an item on local food banks (imagine how many people the money raised by him at his “Benefits Jokes” auction would have fed). Note that Claire Wright frequently comments and feels enraged by the local deprivation that makes them necessary.
Then followed an item about beavers being returned to the River Otter – something that Claire Wright has strongly campaigned for since thet were first discovered there and before others got on the bandwaggon (Hugo simply noted recently that he was pleased to hear they might return).
Shame Spotlight could not have contrasted the two main contenders different aporoaches and styles.
Coincidentally I then turned on to a delayed ITV news to see a clip of David Cameron being severely heckled by pensioners about the health service.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/david-cameron-heckled-pensioners-tries-5392771
Again something on which Claire Wright tirelessly campaigns.
Not a good day for Mr Swire or his party!
Hugo Swire responds
Martyn Oates @bbcmartynoates 3m3 minutes ago:
Hugo Swire: “This was an off the cuff dig to raise money for the party. It was not an attack on the Welfare State”.
Didn’t sound like that to us (on less than the salary he pays his wife (£30-35,000) who doesn’t seem to answer the phone in his office when our contacts have rung).
And the joke about expensive cars: not an attack on MPs curtailed expenses that saw him pay hundreds of pounds for an iPad cover when some of us only have that – or less – to pay for a second-hand car? Originally claimed on expenses but later repaid when the purchase hit the headlines.
And the joke about buying Greece for “another £5,000″ for a case of wine: not an attack on the price of wine, perhaps? Bet the Greeks struggling to survive laughed at that one.
Isn’t it odd that Hugo only chooses to attack the poor and defend the rich? Well, maybe not.
The biggest problem here is that we have an MP that says one thing in public and another thing when amongst his rich friends. That is the sort of error of judgment you just don’t want in your MP. Though to be fair, he rarely has time to visit us to make his gaffes.
Shall we see him at a food bank or second- hand car showroom in East Devon to show his solidarity with us – all being ” in it” together?
And what jokes does he tell about his constituency to his rich pals behind those oft-closed doors?
East Devon Watch 