Blogging from the Highlands of Scotland
'From fanaticism to barbarism is only one step' - Diderot

Thursday 14 July 2005

Stephen Byers lied. Not a surprise.

Under close questionning today in the High Court in London Stephen Byers MP, former Transport Minister admitted:

"It was not a truthful statement and I apologise for that. I can't remember the motivations behind it."

This was in regard to his earlier protestations before a House of Commons sub-committee that he had been unaware of a change in Railtrack's status being discussed before 25 July 2001. The barrister acting on behalf of the [small] shareholders of Railtrack challenged this version of events and, for good measure, presented documentary evidence to the court that this was no more than a pack of lies - which is why Byers, finally, admitted what many had long suspected. The likelihood of him ever admitting the truth had he not been forced into it by being faced with incontrovertible proof is 'probably' [as they say about a certain beer being the best in the world!] negligible. As for his second comment about not being able to "remember the motivations behind it [i.e. the lie]", well this weasily obfuscation ain't foolin' no-one Mr Byers!

One thing is clear though; the question I posed in an earlier post about whether Byers is an honest politician has been answered. The answer is "No".

No comments:

Post a Comment

Welcome to my comment area. Whilst all comment is welcome you are requested to respect the views of others. To read full terms for use of this facility, please visit my 'Terms of Use' section, linked to under the 'About this Blog' heading at top right of the blog. Note added 12JUL2010 - All comments will now be pre-moderated before they appear in this blog; this is a measure to prevent 'spam' commenting, which has become frequent of late. Thank you.