More cash questions
Sir: Mr Mike Al Cole has been uncharac- teristically quiet recently. I thought he must be busy finishing his new book, Famous Last Words. Or was he inadvertently locked in the Harrods safe deposit department after the last break-in?
I was pleased by his return to the Specta- tor's letters column last week, still singing the old songs. He claims 'three mature and reputable witnesses' saw me receiving cash from his boss, Mohamed Fayed.
Readers can judge the worth of the evi- dence from the following: 1. All are very Iong-serving employees of Fayed. As I reported to the Commons Standards Committee, Fayed's employees obeyed his orders to break into Tiny Row- land's safe deposit box. John Macnamara, security director of Harrods, summed up employees' reaction to a Fayed order thus: `If the chairman wants it done, we do it.'
2. Despite working cheek by jowl with Fayed in his office, they did not appear until 27 September 1996 — three and a quarter years after Fayed first made his
LETTERS
allegations to the Guardian and two years after I issued my writ against the Guardian.
3. Their allegation that I had collected cash in brown envelopes from Fayed's offices was completely novel and contra- dicted Fayed's own earlier witness state- ment that he had paid me only via Ian Greer and in face-to-face meetings without witnesses or records.
4. Philip Bromfield, Fayed's security guard for 14 years, claimed to remember giving me, seven to ten years earlier, two envelopes, of whose contents he was unaware. He also 'remembered' giving envelopes to Tim Smith — surprisingly, as Smith was never paid in this way! Further- more, he 'forgot' about giving envelopes to Francesca Pollard, who received brown envelopes every month from 1987 to 1991! A reliable witness?
5. Fayed's PA for 13 years, Alison Bozek, after admitting stuffing envelopes with cash to Fayed's order, was asked by Downey whether she felt any moral unease, and replied, No!' Fayed's former solicitors, Allen & Overy, gave her a job and the glowing reference referred to by Cole. Per- haps they would care to comment on whether (a) she was telling the truth or (b) if she was lying, such a morally stunted per- son is reliable and fit to be a solicitor?
6. Fayed falsely accused Michael Howard MP of taking bribes of over £1 million. The only evidence was the word of Fayed and his employees. Downey refused to accept it because it was not independent corrobora- tion. Downey applied double standards by not requiring evidence independent of Fayed in my case. Incidentally, Paul Johnson understated his case against Rusbridger. He took excep- tion to the Guardian's mendacious headline (Nine votes to nil — he took the cash') because one member, Quentin Davies, voted against the Standards Committee's Report.
Rusbridger's porkie was very much big- ger than that. The Committee voted 9-0 against a statement endorsing Downey's opinion. Rusbridger, therefore, turned truth on its head.
Importantly also, Downey dismissed alto- gether the original Fayed/Guardian allega- tion (which led me to sue for libel) that Ian Greer had paid me cash for questions on Fayed's behalf. Will Rusbridger now have the good grace to admit the Guardian was wrong?
Neil Hamilton
The Old Rectory, Nether Alderley, Macclesfield, Cheshire
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