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Watchdog Urges Blair to Personally Step Into Prescott Probe

Prime Minister Tony Blair has been urged to personally hold an inquiry on his deputy by Sir Alistair Graham, the official Whitehall "sleaze" watchdog.

Sir Graham has prompted Blair to 'clear the air' by looking into the matter of John Prescott's contact with casino tycoon Philip Anschutz.

Prescott has been put in a compromising position following the revelation that he has been personally meeting with the billionaire even as Anschutz is in the precarious position of being a bidder to operate Britain's first super casino.

Prescott has been under heavy accusations that he violated ministerial codes by associating with Anschutz.

Sir Alistair Graham, the chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life warned the Prime Minister not to allow "political considerations" to stand in the way of an investigation.

Sir Graham also advised Blair to ask Sir John Bourn, the head of the National Audit Office to likewise look into the matter.

The admonitions came after reports of Prescott having received an elaborate wild west outfit from Anschutz, allegedly given during his vacation at the latter's Colorado ranch last year.

"It does seem to me when these issues relate to a central aspect of Government policy in terms of casinos, the future of the Dome, planning issues like that, it would be much better to clear the air by invoking the procedure to ask Sir John Bourn to carry out an investigation," Sir Graham told BBC Radio 4's The World This Weekend.

"I think the Prime Minister and the Government would be better positioned in dealing with these issues if they used the procedure that he himself introduced only fairly recently."

"Otherwise you lay yourselves open to the criticism either that you are rather lax or don't care sufficiently about standards issues, or political considerations in terms of whether there could be a deputy leader election - all those sorts of political-type issues - are uppermost in your mind rather than what is proper from a public point of view," he added.

 

Monday, 24. 2006
Edward O'Connor