(Table of Contents)THE PRIVATE computer files of Michael Portillo, the defence secretary, are being touted for sale after being copied from disks kept in his parliamentary office.
Portillo: Scotland Yard called in
This weekend Portillo called in Special Branch detectives after learning of the "very serious" breach of security.
The Sunday Times was offered the contents, involving 7,000 items on 12 floppy disks, for £2,000. They were said to include Portillo's political and private correspondence, including letters marked "confidential", addresses, travel plans, bank account details and credit card numbers.
The newspaper was told that private records belonging to Michael Heseltine, the deputy prime minister, and Michael Howard, the home secretary, could be made available in future from the same source.
The man peddling the files is Simon Regan, 54, who as editor of the satirical magazine Scallywag ran smear stories about government ministers. He had to give an undertaking in the High Court not to repeat one allegation about John Major and Clare Latimer, the society caterer.
The Portillo files cover the period from 1987 until last year and are administered by Clemency Ames, his private secretary, at an office in Parliament Street.
The sensitive information, stored on three disks, includes details of Portillo's holidays at the exclusive Gazelle d'Or in Taroudannt, Morocco, as well as trips to Barbados and Avignon in the south of France. Regan says the files also show Portillo is a "fiendish collector" of cartoons that pan him.
Regan at first claimed copies were lodged "probably for security reasons" at Conservative Central Office in Smith Square, from which they had been removed for one day three Sundays ago and brought to him for copying. "It will be difficult, but not at this stage impossible, to get them out again," he said. Later he said the disks had been removed from Portillo's own office by a data maintenance firm and passed to him. He then copied them onto the floppy disks.
Regan said: "I want a few grand but that's it; £2,000 would be fine. I think it's worth it. Each one of those [the floppy disks] is a separate story. It's a fabulous background."
He claimed: "Don't think for one second you have actually broken the law. It hasn't been stolen from any office. It's not subject to any security law."
Regan, from north London, has targeted several senior Tories in Scallywag, which now exists only on the Internet. Angus James, his half-brother, was killed in a car crash in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus last year after travelling there to see Asil Nadir, the fugitive Polly Peck tycoon. He was due to discuss funding a project allegedly involving photographs of a government minister.
Regan has written to Frank Dobson, Labour MP for Holborn and St Pancras, suggesting the brakes on the car had been tampered with.
Ames, who has worked for Portillo for many years, said there were no copies of the disks in Smith Square, but two disks had been taken away for cleaning. She confirmed that the copies being peddled were genuine because of references by Regan to a trip Portillo makes every year to Cambridge with friends to punt on the River Cam.
She said: "Good heavens. I can't believe it. That really is monstrous. This man came to repair my computer and said he would take away the disks to clean them up for me."
Scotland Yard is considering whether offences have been committed, including theft and handling stolen property. Section 161 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act makes it an offence to procure disclosure of personal information covered by the Data Protection Act.
Dear Sirs,(Table of Contents)My name is Simon Regan presently of the Lord Nelson Public House, 48 Stanhope Street, London, NW1. I am the founding editor/publisher of Scallywag magazine. I have been a professional journalist for thirty years and in that time have had work published in every major magazine and newspaper in the world, including, dozens of times, The Sunday Times. Hitherto I have always had excellent relationships with that newspaper, and others owned by Rupert Murdoch. I always enjoyed with the ST a position of mutual trust as is normal between professional journalists.
As editor of Scallywag I have over the past five years published many articles about the various cabinet ministers who have passed through this present Conservative regime. This has included Michael Portillo, the present Defence Secretary of whom I have made several serious allegations which have so far never been contested. My readers and others are all aware of the fact that I have a great and professional interest in Portillo. Over the years a substantial amount of information and material has been submitted to me and, if it checked out, it has been published by me in magazine form and/or on the internet. My quest for information about him has been legitimate and always published in the public interest.
In mid-January a contact came to see me in the Lord Nelson. He works for a computer company and he was undertaking a computer maintenance job for Clemency Ames. Mr. Portillo's private secretary. All Portillo's constituency files, including many personal files and details, had been put onto two syquest discs which had become fragmented. Rightly or wrongly, Ms Ames had given the two discs to my contact to be cleaned. With her permission he had taken them back to his office for a week. While cleaning them he came across several mentions of Scallywag magazine and myself. Unsolicited by me, he came to see me with the syquest files in order that I may read those references to me. He did not ask for, or was offered, any kind of fee. I naturally bought him several beers while I was examining the discs. That was his only recompense.
There were some 7000 items on these discs and I was told they consisted of some 100 megabytes. It was clearly impossible for me to peruse all the files at one sitting and I asked my contact if I may copy the entire 7000 items onto my lap top so I could read them at leisure. He agreed to this and with equipment he supplied we transferred the items onto my own computer. I then spent the next 100 hours, almost without respite, going through the contents.
A vast majority of the information was of no interest. It was common or garden, day to day, replies to constituents, etc.. But there were several themes which emerged which were of great interest to any professional Portillo watcher. For example, just how Spanish IS Michael Portillo? Not, you might agree, riveting stuff, but as he emerges as a keen bullfight buff, a lover of Spain, an avid supporter of the Basques, etc. It was of passing interest to anyone who might be contemplating a profile of a man who is seriously considered to be a future leader of the Conservatives and possible Prime Minister. There were other themes which were entirely innocent and I am sure that if one had asked Mr. Portillo personally, he would have been happy to talk about them. For example, his love of punting on the Cam; his collection of original cartoons which pan him; His interests in Cyprus, and so on. But there were other themes of subtle importance if you had the kind of background knowledge which I did. He showed himself to be, for example, a keen supporter of Israel who let the Foreign Secretary know his full views about supporting Israel against all PLO initiatives. This is from a man who is now Defence Secretary. This, I would claim, is well within public interest.
The files contained just about every invitation list and seating plan of every dinner or party Portillo had given, and he is a great party giver. This included wedding anniversaries, birthdays, Cambridge anniversaries, old school get-togethers, and fun parties for no reason at all. A close scrutiny of these lists showed clearly who was within the close retinue of good friends, political and social. Five names featured very heavily throughout these lists. The names also featured in holidays together at the Gazelle D'or in Morocco and a most odd venture - a holiday romp for the boys - in Barbados. It is only of passing interest to me that the Gazelle D'or, which I have visited, happens to be Morocco's most famous Gay venue, first built by a notorious French Queen who supplied all his friends and patrons with Berber warriors. They are still supplied, and they come on the bill.
There was one main point of genuine interest to me. The files listed several thank you letters for what can only be described as perks. For example, the PR of Luton airport supplied Portillo with the free use of a Lear Jet during the time when the airport was lobbying to grow. British Airways supplied very generous credit and gold card facilities, and free parking at Heathrow, during the time they were lobbying against Virgin airways, and so on. The files did not reveal whether these and several other "gifts" had been registered on the Registry of Member's Interests. If they had not been then, however the files had been leaked to me, there was a genuine public interest. I did not, however, at this time plan to publish anything. Rather, I gave my edited file to a former lobby correspondent who had access to the latest Registry and who could check for me.
She read the file and found it of interest and apparently had met Maurice Chittenden, Associate Editor (news) of the Sunday Times and mentioned that the file existed. I had made arrangements to also show the file to a senior member of the staff of the Independent on Sunday, a man who I trust implicitly and to whom I was going to ask for advice. Not just on what I should do with the information, but what he felt about the legal aspects. However, my lobby friend told me Chittenden was preparing a lengthy profile on Michael Portillo with the view of writing a major story should he become Tory leader. Would I, she asked, meet Chittenden and show him the file (purely for his information). I agreed to do so and on Friday 31st January at lunchtime he visited me at the Lord Nelson. I never once 'touted' or 'peddled' anything. Chittenden showed a very great interest and I gave him a copy of the file and three floppy discs on which some of the more vital information had been stored. He said before leaving, "okay, what's the bottom line. What do you want for it?"
This was something I genuinely had not thought of at that time. I told him to take it away and read it and if at a later stage he felt he might use information from it, we should negotiate a price. I would have been happy to have covered my expenses. He insisted on a price and I said that if he used substantial parts of the file I thought it would probably be worth about £2,000. It was a figure direct from the top of my head. It was an arbitrary figure and in fact the files are potentially probably worth a great deal more. I didn't anyway, want to sell it to the ST. If I did ever sell it, it would be to the Independent on Sunday. Despite the fact that I knew Chittenden had worked very closely with my arch enemy, Dr. Julian Lewis, at the CCO, I trusted him enough to let him take the files away to read. He knew that I planned to stand for parliament in the constituency being contested by Lewis (New Forest, East) and was looking for backing. Naturally, I hoped he might give this situation some publicity.
The last thing we talked about was the legal situation and I said I would be grateful if he talked to his lawyers at the ST and advised me as to the Data Information Act. Although I was pretty certain at that time, I had not committed any crime. He agreed to do this and get back to me.
He therefore had my file for two days before publication. On Saturday night, 1st February at 10.30 pm. two officers from Special Branch at Scotland Yard arrested me at the Lord Nelson where, because the owner was away, I was in sole charge. They seized my computer, every one of my floppy discs - dozens containing information which had nothing to do with the case in question - half written books, articles, personal letters, and so on - and they took all my files. None of this has been returned to me and is causing me much distress because without them I cannot work. I was apprehended under arrest on theft charges for twenty hours. I was placed in a police cell and interviewed throughout the night and following day. I was not charged with any offence and was bailed to appear before them on March 4th. On the Sunday morning they showed me a copy of the Sunday Times which contained the article by Chittenden. Without any negotiation with me, Chittenden had approached Portillo's office and told them he had a file and was going to publish. Naturally they called in the police.
I have been quite unnecessarily deprived of my liberty. I have lost any chance I may have had of marketing important information - or of using it myself. I have been deprived of my property to the serious detriment of my trading. And, a great deal worse, my contact has been cruelly exposed and will naturally lose his high-paid job. This was completely unnecessary because if Chittenden had said that his lawyers and/or editor had decided the file should go to the police I would have gone with him and co-operated fully. I contend that it was a gross injustice to me and to my contact that the Sunday Times should have taken this arbitrary action and that it was most unfair journalistic practise. I have got used, over thirty years to being able to trust in a hand shake between myself and a "reputable" senior journalist working for a "reputable" newspaper. I have not been charged with anything and I am advised it is extremely unlikely that I will be. If I am, however, it will give me the opportunity, in open court, to say just why I had an interest in these files.
Chris Blackhurst hears the strange tale of the 'Scallywag' editor, the computer disks and the happy home life of the Defence Secretary1 The pub is called "Captain Cutler's" (48 Stanhope Street, London NW1 3EX)Shock! Horror! Sensation! Michael Portillo, the Defence Secretary, is a happily married man after all, who cares about his family and his constituents.
Simon Regan, the former editor of scurrilous magazine Scallywag, and source of dark rumours about Mr Portillo's private life, which spread like wildfire through London' chattering classes and beyond, now admits he may have got him wrong.
This atonishing recantation, delivered exclusively to the Independent on Sunday over several pints and more than a few fags in the bar of the Lord Nelson1, the central London pub Mr Regan now runs, may have profound political implications.
It represents a major step on the road to rehabilitating Mr Portillo, who was left reeling by criticism of his swaggering "SAS" speech at the Conservative Party conference in 1995 and the rowdy behaviour of a private party in his office overlooking a military parade on Horseguards attended by Princess Margaret last summer.
After keeping his head down, Mr Portillo has started raising his profile again. The public embracing of the school cadet corps initiative, the announcement on a taxpayer-funded replacement for the royal yacht and, last night, a speech lauding the notable Tory wets, Harold Macmillan and Chris Patten, all point to a comeback.
To give him an extra push, Mr Regan makes the extraordinary admission that "he seems a happily married man, kind to his constituents and caring".
What began, according to the more than a little louche Mr Regan, with a tip from another journalist - in time-honoured tradition he will not say who - that Mr Portillo's private life deserved scrutiny, ended in dramatic fashion at 10.30 last Saturday night. Special Branch officers swooped on the Lord Nelson and the caravan in the back garden in which the former editor, who caused a sensation by claiming, wrongly, that John Major was having an affair with his Downing Street cook, now lives.
In the caravan, Scotland Yard's finest found 12 computer disks containing 7,000 items of personal correspondence and files from Mr Portillo's parliamentary office. The police made their move after Mr Regan had tried to sell the disks to the Sunday Times. He was hauled off to Belgravia police station and questioned for 20 hours about what the paper said was "a very serious breach of security".
The thought of Mr Regan, an endearingly shambolic 54-year-old, penetrating the files of Britain's military chief, was hard to fathom. As ever, the explanation was simple: a computer technician was cleaning up the disks as part of a maintenance contract with Mr Portillo's office, he saw what was on them and like any good Scallywag reader, contacted Mr Regan.
London society salons, and readers of Scallywag and its version on the Internet - since closing last year, the magazine's back issues and new pieces have been available on the Web, attracting 17,000 browser a day - held their collective breath. Here, surely, was the proof they had been promised.
Alas, it is not to be. The letters reveal a man who takes the time and trouble to write considered replies to his constituents, who maintains a close circle of mostly married friends, gives black tie dinner parties, has fond memories of his old Harrow County school, reveres his late Spanish Republican father and is passionate about bull-fighting.
True, there are letters to Peterhouse, his old Cambridge college, claimed in Scallywag to be at the center of a gay security services-related network, but they are mainly about arranging an annual punting trip on the River Cam. Details of Mr Portillo's holidays, also the subject of much attention in Scallywag, including one famously long and lurid feature about a trip to the Gazelle d'Or hotel in Morocco, are also in the files.
Again, instead of the camp bachelors, claimed to be in attendance, the others on the trip are mainly married couples. The Gazelle d'Or is there, but of the alleged services provided by the local Berber boys there is not even a whisper.
There are some curious pieces of eccentricity. Mr Portillo's nickname for his wife, Carolyn, among his holiday companions is apparently the Chief Accountant. She keeps a tab on all their bills and proportions them out when they get back home.
As a career politician, Mr Portillo cannot resist politician-speak, so a letter to friends arranging a date for punting talks of "polling stations", and a "landslide victory" for those favouring Saturday, 29 August.
It is all harmless, mundane stuff, nothing like the picture painted in Scallywag. Mr Regan is devastated: "I was looking for shit and I did not find any."
Mr Regan added: "By and large, I'm disappointed. When I got them, I thought here are 7,000 items I can retire on. But there is nothing in the files that says, 'hello, darling, I'm missing you badly'."
Mr Regan was released without charge. Some of the letters may find their way by circuitous means on to the Internet, where people can form their own judgement. In the meantime, Mr Regan is left to contemplate the scoop that never was.
Part of his depression can be explained by his failure to use part of the money from selling the disks to a newspaper, to stand in the general election against another of his prime foes, Julian Lewis, the former deputy head of research at Tory Central Office and the party's candidate for the New Forest. Like Mr Portillo, Mr Lewis is a right-winger. And like Mr Portillo, he has little to fear at present from a chastened Simon Regan.
The present situation is that I have so far yet to face any kind of charge, but the circumstances of the arrest have been referred to the Crown Prosecutions Service (CPS) and I am bailed to return to Belgravia police station on March 24th. In the meantime all my own files and equipment, including personal letters to my family, private letters to contacts, two finished MSS's of books, one half finished book, one play, one libretto, twelve articles for magazines and newspapers, (all in the editing and marketing stage), and, incidentally, the whole next edition of Scallywag, have been confiscated indefinitely and any request as to their present whereabouts, or possible return, merely elicits an acknowledgement of letter.
Ninety-nine percent of the information on these discs, or on the computer itself, is completely irrelevant to the inquiries presently going on. None of it is of any interest to any branch of the authorities.
The three possible charges, of theft, handling stolen property, and possible violation of the Data Protection Act, are highly disputable. The legal precedences of whether any information which may come into my hands (and which has been sent out of the office of origination by a member of that office) change almost by the week. There is absolutely no question in this case of hacking into someone's private system, which the data act was aimed to defend. It was a common or garden 'leak' - the type that happens almost every hour of every day between interested parties, mainly government moles to favourite journalists, or ambitious Members who want publicity for their pet gripes or aspirations.
The two journalists who I dealt with on this situation, Maurice Chittenden of the Sunday Times, and Chris Blackhurst of the Independent on Sunday, are both senior staffers (assistant editors) who have both risen to the middle ranks through their parliamentary contacts. They know the system backwards when it comes to leaks from the Palace of Westminster. Although there is always something slightly underhand on the leaking process, it is what the lobby survives for and on. Politicians and journalists develop mutual friendships in which trust is implicit between both sides. It is the ultimate back-scratching relationship in which both sides mainly get what they want. While this is rarely particularly honourable, it is highly acceptable - both in parliament and throughout the media. And it is hypocrisy in the extreme for either of these journalists to get on a high horse concerning where information may have originated. This is the very grey area of the Data Protection Act, for almost every bit of information passed to a Westminster Correspondent (as against a Political Editor or Parliamentary Correspondent) has in effect been purloined.
What I ended up with in these cases is one clear stitch-up and one clear Whitewash, both men blaming, of course, editors and lawyers. The stitch- up was an appalling example of the worst kind of journalistic practice in which a senior journalist obtained information by deception, knowing full well how he was going to deal with it. The Whitewash, which purported to show that I was some kind of reformed champion of Portillo's and that Dr. Julian Lewis, Scallywag's arch enemy had nothing to fear from a "chastened Simon Regan," was sheer balderdash. Nothing has actually changed my opinion of either of them.
Anyway, neither was able or willing to tell the story and both opted for the easy version of knocking Scallywag in the guise of leaking information into their own newspapers. It was an easy way out and I resent it most because the "legitimate press" has always pretended to hold us in some odium while pursuing our own "rumours" and on this one, whatever the files revealed, it was a genuine scoop. It was very below the professional belt to try and make it into merely another sleazy journalistic operation.
But the main point of justification was whether the discs contained information which would, or could, cast aspersions on the character and integrity of the Defence Minister. If there had not been a genuine doubt as to this, then the only course would have been to hand back the discs, say thank you very much, and forget about them. Likewise, if the information had been classified in any way, and with the Defence Secretary this as a definite possibility, then it would have been a clear duty to report a breach of security to the very same officers who arrested me. But there was not a single word I could find which was of any ministerial business.
All this of course is another very grey area of which Mr. Chittenden and Mr. Blackhurst are very, very conversant. Should the discs have contained, for example, an illegal arms sale to Iran, or even encouragement of such, or, let's say, a private memo between ministers dealing with the on-going cover-up concerning Mohammed Al Fayed, which had either been detrimental or conspirational, then at what point would it have been in the public interest to reveal it?
As it happened these files fell rather in the middle. They were of great interest to any Portillo watcher, but, however hard one looked, there was not a single major scandal to be seen anywhere in the 7,000 items consisting of approximately one and a half million words.
If nothing else, this shows Michael Portillo's clever dexterity as an ambitious seeker after Number Ten. I warrant that very few of his colleagues could keep such a clean slate for such a long time on the ladder of power in their own private files.
That said, there were several items which did more than raise the eyebrows of any interested party. And they were such that the question of public interest became an authentic border line case. Also, in some ways, the very negativity of the files was of interest. Certainly, there were no illicit love letters to be found. Nor, indeed, confessions of any kind. But why not? These are private files and never once has any allegation about him (and, God forbid, there are a whole catalogue of them) ever been so much as referred to, with the exception of a letter to his old History tutor, Maurice Cowling, at Peterhouse, advising him to ignore everything Scallywag had alleged because it would only fan flames if it was in any way acknowledged.
The computer, the floppy discs, and all printed out material concerning these discs are impounded by the police. But I had pored over these files for two weeks and then typed out extensive notes about what had particularly interested me and, despite old age, believe myself to still be journalist enough to have retained the important information in my head, which, of course, they cannot impound. It is now open to public debate and people can make up their own minds.
I therefore give a resumé of my findings, purely on the grounds of public interest concerning a man who may well, sometime in the future, be our Prime Minister.
There were twelve main themes which emerged of general interest to me, and it is only fair to say that some of them show Michael Portillo to be rather different to his public persona. He is polite, gentlemanly, enthusiastic, a very good and conscientious constituency MP; he is loyal to friends and family, always speaks well of his wife, and exhibits a genuine sense of humour. Actually, none of this has been in dispute by us and was not particularly surprising.
His naked ambition is quite manifest and his cleverness as a political manipulator is emphasised clearly. There is a sort of overwhelming feeling of false modesty throughout all his correspondence. You can also tell, as he rises consistently in the power game throughout 1989 - 1996, that he thoroughly enjoys all the trappings of power and that he is a great lover of luxury. Again, in a well-bred Public School-Peterhouse man, there are no real surprises here. However, to those who can remember when Michael decided he would find out how the unemployed really lived by going on the dole for a week and renting a slum, the entire venture is quite laughable when you see the actual opulence of his life-style.
The nitty-gritty of all our investigations and subsequent allegations concerning Portillo has been on whether he is or is not a hypocrite in his overtly right-wing flag-waving, robust Queen and country 'patriotism' and his very public stand, throughout his entire controversial career, on family values. This conversation is an old one and has dogged the Conservatives ever since it was so unwisely invented to try and court the blue rinse brigade back into Tory folds. Ever since the spin doctors created it, the Tories have been dogged by scandals of all kinds, especially concerning the libido. Michael's stand on this subject was quite emphatic. His public utterances on the subject, especially as Unemployment Secretary, were highly moralistic bordering on puritanism. At the time, as is still presently the case, Peter Lilley was Secretary of State for Social Welfare, an equally sensitive area when it comes to family values, of which Lilley was an equal enthusiast. We had published a story that on the night of the last General Election messrs Portillo and Lilley had been disturbed on the top floor of the DTI building engaged in a sexual act, by a security guard attracted by the commotion. The guard had reported this to his superiors who had noted what he had said and then promptly send him on a new assignment deep in obscurity. He had been introduced to us by a well known lobby correspondent who had been unable to publish the story in his own newspaper. The guard was very scared and rather more pissed off and made a statement to us to this effect. Rumours flourished that the Lilleys and the Portillos had enjoyed rather risqué gatherings at the former's farm house in Normandy. Neither couple, of course, had had any children and probably little idea of just how a family really survived in modern Britain, especially if they were on the dole. Our central interest was not about the possible shenanigans between couples in private, but purely on their joint and voluble stand on family values.
Portillo's right-wing flag-waving is not in doubt, but is a definite oddity on the grounds that he is so very, very proud of being half Spanish. Maybe it is just a Spanish trait and, after all, he does have an English mother and was brought up entirely in the middle-to-upper classes of the lower British aristocracy. But he does appear to have a need to publicly be a lot more British than the British. As to family values. We have always alleged that he is a closet gay who has had several clandestine affairs with men of his own age and considerably younger, and that this singularly constituted hypocrisy at a time when he was Secretary of State for Employment - very much in the social sector. There is certainly nothing in the file which proves this, but there is a great deal of circumstantial information which does nothing to change our original views. Frankly, these views have not been challenged, but enhanced by these files.
Portillo has been going to the Gazelle D'or in Taroudant every Easter since 1989, without fail. All his air reservations and everything else about each holiday is clearly filed. It has been studiously suggested, both publicly and privately by both Mr. and Mrs Portillo that these holidays were always with other couples. There is no question that Caroline Portillo has indeed accompanied her husband. But married couples are not normally in the habit of sleeping in single units, whether they be suites or the exclusive bungalows in the opulent gardens of the Gazelle. Yet bookings clearly show that on several occasions only one double was booked alongside up to four or six singles.
The Gazelle D'or is one of Morocco's most notorious gay habitats and it always has been. In effect it is little more than a gay brothel in which everything from very young village boys to handsome Berber youths are supplied openly on the bill. An even more odd sojourn was one taken by Portillo and friends to Barbados in July 1992. In August, while Portillo was Chief Secretary to the Treasury, he sent out a bill for "holiday Accounts" from the Chief Accountant to the Chief Secretary for a villa which appears to have cost each of them £1,000 rental for the week. On top of that were various amounts for groceries and meals in which some £4,000 was divided. The people in the party were: Michael Portillo, Michael Brown MP, Simon Marquis, Charles Welby and John Whittingdale. In October Michael and Carolyn threw a party at their house in Ashley Gardens for Michael Brown in which photographs of the holiday were requested to be brought. An additional guest at this black-tie shin-dig was Derek Laud.
Simon Marquis, Derek Laud and Michael Brown were all unaccompanied, but Whittingdale and Welby brought their wives.
Michael Brown is one of the very few Conservative MP's who volunteered to "out" himself as a gay. Derek Laud, now standing for parliament, (against Bernie Grant in North London) ran a Pimlico PR agency called Ludgate Communications for a number of years which supplied young boys for selected parliamentarians from children's homes now being investigated in North Wales. He sometimes did this in cahoots with Ian Greer Associates which has since been scandalised because of the Neil Hamilton Affair and payment for questions on behalf of Al Fayed.
Ludgate Communications was at the very hub of our investigation into the "boys for questions" allegations. At his Pimlico flat, and selected addresses in Dolphin Square nearby, Laud threw paedophile parties and we have one sworn affidavit from a former boy (presently giving evidence in Wales) who claims he was seriously molested (among many others) by Lord McAlpine who was at the time the Tory party's clandestine fund raiser. It was alleged by this boy and others that Messrs Portillo and Lilley were also guests of Derek Laud. We are assured that this particular volcano is about to erupt, both in North Wales and elsewhere. Michael Portillo has always publicly disassociated himself from Derek Laud, yet here we find him not only acquainted but seemingly in the inner sanctum of private friends.
I confess Simon Marquis is a completely unknown quantity. Absolutely no one has heard of him. But he is extremely well represented throughout the files. While he was accompanied to one of Portillo's favourite past- times - punting on the Cam every August in Cambridge - he is on his own at almost every other function. He organises the annual punting; he is on the invitation list of most of Portillo's many private and social parties; he has been to the Gazelle D'or, and now he turns up with two known gays in Barbados. And, of course, Michael Portillo.
Even a recent whitewash biography of Portillo acknowledged that the young men of Peterhouse were dominated by a very gay element, fostered by the Dons, including Maurice Cowling.
It is obvious from the files that Marquis was a close friend of Portillo's at Peterhouse and the two of them have kept up an affection for their old college ever since. His last listed address was 30 Morella Road, London SW12.
In a year not designated, Portillo's faithful secretary, Clemency Ames, booked Marquis and Portillo into the Stock Hill House Hotel, at Wyke, Dorset, described as a small country house hotel with seven rooms and a restaurant costing £65 per person per night for dinner, bed and breakfast. It is not specified how many others may be in the party. At the end of the memo by Ames there is a short note saying Marquis needs a referee for a trust company and will send the papers to the "H of C". After living in Weymouth nearby for many years I can attest that Stock Hill is the very height of discretion. It was, for example, one of the love nests favoured by Prince Andrew when he was courting Koo Stark.
What is clear is that Marquis, Brown, Laud and Portillo, with or without his wife, have formed a long-standing inner sanctum of close friendship which permeates most of Portillo's social life, including his many generous dinner parties and their holidays together.
It will inevitably be put down to old mates, loyalty among friends, and the fact that all of them probably really enjoy each other's company quite innocently.
But in my book it adds up to rather a funny one.
Another area where I felt I had every right to take an interest on behalf of the public was in the correspondence to the Register of Members' Interests. In 1992 he wrote to advise the gift of a Persian rug from a constituent, and in 1994 he registered a return air ticket to Amsterdam. According to his own files other letters went in registering a "nil" interest.
But there are a couple of border cases which many other MP's decided should be admitted for themselves. For example most MP's have been to conferences to the Adenour Centre in Northern Italy where they are all very well looked after. Portillo was a guest at least once, but did not declare it.
In July 1990 he was a guest of Texaco at the Centre Court Men's Final at Wimbledon.
In February 1996 he wrote a "thank you" letter for a private Lear Jet (to Newcastle) owned by Chris Foyle, which had been "fixed" by Barry Simmons who happened to be a Luton Airport lobbyist and PR. Luton has a very serious desire to be London's third airport. This was duly noted in the letter.
In fact airlines and ports seem to be a weak point with the Defence Secretary. Portillo was very happy to accept a free car park pass for London Airport and then a complimentary British Airways Executive Card - which gives him many perks - at a time when BA was having a barny with Virgin and when he was reminded by London Airport PR Chris Davies that Heathrow was desperate for a fifth terminal.
Portillo likes his cars, his antiques and his art collection and he was most certainly not averse when he was offered a "substantial discount" from BMG for a black, leather interior, air conditioned Ford Mondeo "Ghia".
There have been several very expensive and classy parties thrown for Michael by friends and constituents, which have never been declared.
Any study of the Register itself shows that most MP's feel it expedient to list everything ever accepted, down to the last pen-nib.
There were other items of relative interest. For example, Portillo writes to the Foreign Secretary, then Douglas Hurd, expressing his support for Israel and suggesting that the PLO should be given no quarter by the British Government. Knowing full well this was a controversial matter this is the only letter in the files marked "Confidential." He clearly passes on the views of the delegation which had lunched him - led by Cyril Stein, Chairman of Ladbrooks - condemning the British Government for meeting with the PLO. He believes that the British Government's "even handedness" is regarded as "unnecessary and offensive". This letter was also sent to the Prime Minister.
At the time Portillo was Chief Secretary to the Treasury, but has he continued this view as Defence Secretary? Knowing his loyalty to the causes he adopts and the fact that Mr. Stein, an ardent Zionist, is a regular guest at the Portillo parties - official and social - it seems likely. As Defence Secretary this is a very partisan view, especially concerning arms deals which the Ministry of Defence may be orchestrating on both sides.
It is also controversial in the sense that a significant number of his own constituents in Enfield South are Muslims and indeed he is deeply involved in the Cyprus Question, for the same reasons.
He also shows some sympathy for the Anglo-Israel Association which invited him to be a guest speaker to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. To anyone who knows anything of Middle Eastern politics, this Declaration is the corner-stone of Arab suspicion and dissent about Britain. It was, after all, the very birth of a British-inspired Israel. He only declined the invitation because he had already been booked as a guest speaker at the Conservative Association Patron's Club.
As an aside, his extensive invitation lists are a picture of adroitness for a rising star. All his dinner parties are well constructed when it comes to mixing people of importance and influence on his future career. The list of guests invited to his 40th birthday party (at the Alexandra Palace) would have been worth thousands at the time of the event. Everyone wanted to know who went - and more important, who did not.
There are many other small insights into this controversial politician which would be of very great interest to a biographer for they show a deep insight into his day to day life and are by no means all risible. His love of cartoons and punting, for example, show his human side. But we rest our case.
From: The Director <injustice@scandals.demon.co.uk> Newsgroups: uk.legal,uk.media,uk.misc,uk.comp.misc, uk.current-events.censorship,uk.politics.censorship, uk.politics.crime,uk.politics.misc,alt.politics.british, alt.censorship Subject: TESTCASE: Computer Misuse Act 1990 * Conviction Quashed! Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 14:23:41 +0000 Organization: Scandals in Justice http://www.scandals.org/ Message-ID: <9njmaKAtHZ70EwEU@scandals.demon.co.uk> Following-up on our previous notices (appended below): Simon Regan, editor of Scallywag, had his conviction of 18 Nov 97 under the Computer Misuse Act (1990) quashed at Southwark Crown Court on Thursday before His Honour Judge Bathurst-Norman sitting with two lay magistrates. Michael Grieve appeared for the appellant instructed by Anthony Burton and Richard Locke of Simons Muirhead & Burton. Aftab Jaffergee appeared for the Crown. The appeal succeeded on a submission of no case to answer in which it was argued that the Crown had failed to produce any evidence that Regan had known that his source's access to the data had been "unauthorised"; thus conforming with the previous DPP -v- Bignal ruling. The Judge expressed his "great regret" at having to find for the appellant. Regan said afterwards that he was very happy with the outcome and felt that the case had been brought in order to clarify an area of uncertain legislation rather than through any high-level conspiracy against him personally. He also expressed his thanks to his legal team and supporters who had stood by him throughout the ordeal. It is expected that a full write-up of the case will appear on http://www.scallywag.org/ in due course. Regan, who has recently published a book entitled Who Killed Diana?, may be contacted on (London) 0171 387 1147 or by email at sr@fidalgo.net Subject: TESTCASE: Computer Misuse Act 1990 * 17-18th Nov Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 23:53:32 +0000 In article <rgHTbLA8ROb0Ew3T@scandals.demon.co.uk>, The Director <injustice@scandals.demon.co.uk> writes >Simon Regan, editor of Scallywag Magazine, and >a computer engineer go on trial on Monday charged >under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 in what many >observers see as a test case. The two principal >convictions so far secured under this legislation >have subsequently collapsed on appeal. > >The charges arose from the "Portillo Disks" affair >widely reported in the British press earlier this >year and covered in detail in Issue 32b (Feb1997) >of Scallywag at URL: http://www.scallywag.org/ > >The CMA 1990 is an important pillar of >state-controlled censorship and freedom of >information issues in Britain. Its ultimate success >or failure will have important implications for all >UK computer users. ... Subject: Re: TESTCASE: Computer Misuse Act 1990 * 17-18th Nov Date: Wed, 19 Nov 1997 12:31:46 +0000 In article <IjzrbCAywtc0Ewah@scandals.demon.co.uk>, The Director <injustice@scandals.demon.co.uk> writes ... >The two accused were convicted and fined modest amounts >(the engineer = £750 plus £50 costs. Regan = £250) > >The case was interesting because it looked as if it might >have fallen into the DPP -v- Bignal category, i.e. a "misuse >of authorised access" which had led to a quashing of that >conviction. > >However, the prosecution cast doubt on whether the engineer >had been "authorised" by the firm contracted to carry out >the maintenance. > >What is odd is that Regan, an unsuspecting journalist who >believed he was receiving a "leak" of legally obtained >material, somehow inherited his source's lack of authorisation. ... >If the leaked material had been circulated as a paper printout >rather than disk copies, no charges under the CMA 1990 could >have resulted against Regan. ... -- The Director injustice@scandals.demon.co.uk The Commission on Scandals in Justice http://www.scandals.org/ |
Well, it is now official. "Bignal and Regan," a double precedent against the crown on the subject of a much unknown, or at least largely unrecognised, legal situation in which the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) blatantly attempted to create a new and potentially most important "gagging" order.
And they have so far failed to slip and slide it into British law. The ramifications are immense and quite clearly the Misuse of Computer Act (MCA) must now be re-visited if it is to retain any credence or potency. What the crown was attempting to do was simple. They wanted to stop digital leaks. But the Act itself was to do with hacking, or, as it specifies, "unauthorised access to computer information."
If information was leaked on a piece of paper it remained largely legal, unless it came under, say, the Official Secrets Act. If that information was on a disk, then the persons involved in the leak on both sides were criminal. The CPS attempted to twist a law designed to combat hacking into a far more general and wide-ranging piece of legislation which would criminalise the leaking of information if it was digital.
To start at the beginning: Sometime in early 1997 Scallywag received a telephone call from an acquaintance who said he had two SyQuest disks which contained all the constituency files of the then Minister of Defence, Michael Portillo. On these disks Scallywag was mentioned several times. Did I want to look at them?
The question was naturally rhetorical. Scallywag had embarked during the middle of the last Tory Government on a series of serious accusations against certain government ministers, which included, quite manifestly, the Right Honourable Minister of Defence. No one, including the informant, knew what was on these disks at the time. But it was of some fascination to me to find out whether there was anything of a compromising nature that could back up our claims.
So I naturally said yes. The informant, a one Julian Taylor, duly came to the Lord Nelson pub in Regent's Park, North London, where, at the time, I was a probationary licensee. I brought my laptop to the bar and he fitted his own equipment up so that he could copy what was on the SyQuest disk on to my own system, purely so that I could read it at my leisure.
As it happened, one of the disks had completely malfunctioned and was unreadable. The other contained an estimated 7,500 items. Each disk had needed de-fragmentation and had been given to Taylor by Clemency Ames, Portillo's constituency secretary, who had authorised him to do what was necessary to "clean" them. She was doing so under a contract with the firm that Taylor said he worked for. There was absolutely no reason for me to question this.
They were duly copied onto my laptop and over a three-week period I read them all. I edited some of the items into sub- headings and put these onto floppy disks. I then edited them into what I felt was relevant material. In real terms, to a Scallywag, it was all a waste of time. The material was mundane to the point of boredom. But I learnt a lot about Portillo's persona and actually came out rather liking him. He was quite obviously a very good constituency MP and, as a Spanophile, I admired his constant stand for things Spanish, including, very controversially, bullfighting.
Any serious student of Michael Portillo would have gained access to a side of him not necessarily available to the man on the Clapham Omnibus. Nonetheless, there was information that could have been potentially damaging. One item was a confidential letter from him as Minister of Defence to Malcolm Rifkin, then the Foreign Minister, which was clearly a straight lobby on behalf of Zionism. It had followed a meeting the night before in which prominent British Zionists had successfully persuaded him that the FO's attitude in the Middle East was far too "Arabic". Portillo strove to argue against the Arabs. This is from the Minister of Defence whose judgement would have been vital in any future Mid-East conflict. Especially as Portillo was being seriously mooted as the next leader of the party and presumably, one day, PM.
It was this kind of information that should be leaked. As it is almost every day to journalists from all over Westminster and Whitehall. While it was by no means earth shattering, it was the kind of material I felt justified in reading.
I now know how much Portillo loves Punting on the Cam. I know he has a first class collection of cartoons against himself. I know much of his private financial arrangements. I know who he invites to dinner parties and what his stance is on the "Cyprus Question." None of it riveting stuff, but interesting to a journalist who wants to get "inside" someone.
There was nothing, absolutely nothing, of a positive compromising nature which could possibly back up my own claims - that while he was Minister for Unemployment and had embarked on a lengthy campaign for "Family Values" he was an active homosexual who had attended parties which involved underage children. I was after hypocrisy and found none. So, basically, I was going to call it a day and not take any further action.
There were just two last things that niggled and they were the sections I put under "perks" and "contacts." In these it appeared he had accepted some perks during the time he could have been politically relevant to the donor. For example, he had accepted the use of a private jet from Luton airport to Glasgow during a time when Luton airport was lobbying to become London's third airport. "Sleaze" was all the rage at the time and I felt this might be an example. Secondly, there were several names on the disks that were completely new to me and but by the nature of the letters could have been cryptic "gays."
As all half-decent journalists should do, before wrapping up the story as a dead loss, I decided to check it out and went to a former lobby correspondent to firstly ask this person if they had access to the "Register of Members Interests" in which all serving MP's were obliged to declare any financial gain, simply to see if he had, for example, declared the free jet ride. I then wanted to know if this person knew any of the names that I was unsure of.
Both came back negative, but on her own bat she had contacted Maurice Chittenden, of the Sunday Times, widely known in the trade as "Shittenden", which I am sure he was also called at public school. He immediately called me and asked if we could "chat". I presumed it was off-the-record and he duly met me at the Lord Nelson. He told me he was doing a long-term profile on Portillo, should the Minister become, as expected, the leader of the Tories. I was quite happy to co-operate, in a completely gentlemanly fashion between two professional journalists. He mentioned money and I pooh-poohed it but said something like, "If you read this file and at any time use the contents, then give me what you think it is worth."
He persisted, "Come on now, what's the bottom line? What are you asking? One thousand? Ten thousand?"
I said nothing was for sale as such but it had taken me three weeks to prepare the documents I had given him and a figure of around two thousand pounds would probably be fair. This was a Thursday. His action was verbal entrapment into a statement which was later made in the Sunday Times that I had "hawked stolen documents" around Fleet Street.
According to his statement, and those of the police, at a later Magistrate's hearing, he had gone back to the office and immediately rang Clemency Ames and told her the contents of the SyQuest disks were being hawked around by me. Naturally, she knew it must have been Taylor who had shown them to me. She called Portillo and he instructed her to call the police.
It was not just the station sergeant who raided the Lord Nelson on that Saturday night. It was two officers from the International Serious Crime Squad and altogether six of them were called in to deal with this, including a Chief Superintendent. I am not, actually, arguing about this. After all, it was all about the Minister of Defence, and no one really knew what I had got on those disks. It could have been state secrets. I was subsequently arrested for theft, receiving and a misdemeanour under the Data Protection Act and carted off at 11 PM to Belgravia Police Station where I was quickly incarcerated in Cell 11, which, for pundits of detail, had 1,700 separate white tiles. They had raided my bedroom and taken away all my computer equipment and every disk they could find which effectively deprived me of a livelihood for almost a year. Not just the equipment, but what was on it, including three finished books which were just about to be published.
As we had had a rather heavy night in the pub I was then inspected by a police surgeon to see if I was drunk and disorderly and to my surprise he found that I was not. They wanted to keep me in because they had not traced Taylor and they suspected collusion. So it really was a night on the tiles and I only managed to contact David Price, my ever-so faithful solicitor, at nine AM the next morning. So I made a statement which was recorded and in which I refused to name my source and which has now been read out in court so often that it bores me to death.
The police then showed me that Sunday morning's edition of the Sunday Times in which my "hawking of stolen documents" had been front-paged.
At about five PM that day I was bailed out and subsequently had to return to Belgravia police station three times. On the third time they changed the charge to Misuse of Computers. This was a little confusing but Data Protection was a Crown Court offence in which I could have put my case to a jury. Misuse of Computers was a Stipendary matter that could only go to a Magistrates Court, unless I was found guilty and could then appeal.
Naturally, my fingerprints were taken - along with a mug shot and I eventually, with Taylor, was subsequently convicted at Horseferry Road Magistrate's Court on 18 November 1997. I was fined £250 and costs of a further £250. Taylor was fined £500 and £500 costs. The magistrate clearly showed at a very early stage that he felt we were a couple of crooked rogues up to no good and he virtually ignored a brilliant defence based on Bignal.
Bignal is fairly well chronicled but involved a man who had persuaded several police officers to give him identity details based on car numbers on police computers. It was ruled - and this was crucial - that even though there might be a "purpose" which was completely unethical, the officers were indeed "authorised" to access the computer. As the law stated clearly "unauthorised access" the court on appeal found for the appellant.
The magistrate in our original trial rejected this argument and found us guilty. I then had "previous" which would be important if and when I was arrested again. As I had, between the magistrate's hearing and the appeal, been interviewed by the police on a possible charge of Misrepresentation of the People Act (MPA), and a report had gone to the CPS for viewing this could be highly relevant.
This complaint had been filed by my old adversary Julian Lewis (former head of the Dirty Tricks Department at the Conservative Central Office) who was claiming that I had lied about him when he successfully stood for Parliament for the New Forest East constituency in the last general election.
As I had been unaware of the Misuse of Computer Act, so I was unaware of this one and began to realise there were a dozen other acts out there which I had never heard of but could be used against me at a further stage. All these acts had a point. MCA, for example, to be used against illegal hacking. The MPA against nutcases who purposely set out to ruin a potential MP's character by knowingly lying. But in both of these cases the judiciary and Lewis were setting out to use the law as a weapon for which it was not conceived.
Anyway, on the 19th February, almost a full year after I had first received the disks, an appeal was held at Southwark Crown Court before Mr Justice Bathurst-Norman. I was warned that the judge was a "stickler", first of all for brevity in court, but secondly for the law itself. Indeed he was - on both sides. That is, both defence and prosecution got plenty of stick in equal doses. That suited me.
In essence he agreed with defence counsel, Michael Grieves from the Chambers of Geoffrey Robertson QC, that even though we might be a couple of scoundrels up to no good, that was irrelevant. Taylor had been authorised to access and to copy the contents of the SyQuest disk, and whether he did it on his machine or mine, that did not contravene the act.
He found for the appellant, me, on a half-way legal submission of "no case to answer". The conviction was quashed and presumably I can now get my computer back. Along, of course, with my fingerprints and mug shots and if Julian Lewis gets me, I will have no "previous".
It was crystal clear at a very early stage that the CPS was putting its full force behind a conviction that would have had huge political implications. Had the CPS been successful, then any confidential information in the future which had been stored on any computer and then copied on to another one, would be a criminal act liable to six months imprisonment. This turned the whole thing from being a "hacking offence" into being a "gagging law."
For a while at least, Bignal and I have seen them off.
