Feb/10
11:45 42
Huge debts of Tory candidate leave voters with prospect of disqualified MP
One of the Tories’ star PPCs has been reported as having defaulted on ‘debts’ of nearly £325,000. The Mirror reveals that Bristol East candidate Adeela Shafi, who was hand picked by Cameron to open for him at Conservative conference in 2008, has ”has had three county court judgments against her since 2007″.
The Insolvency Act 1986 and Enterprise Act 2002 outlaw undischarged bankrupts from standing for Westminster and provide for bankrupt MPs to be turfed out. Application for a bankruptcy petition by creditors (her husband was declared insolvent in 2000) could leave the Tories without a candidate or, should Shafi pull off a shock win in Bristol East, a Member of Parliament. Scrapbook doubts this is the kind of gamble voters will plump for on May 6.
The bombshell leaves Shafi open to allegations of recklessness from fellow Tories and recalls the recent case of the SNP’s original candidate in the Glasgow North East by-election, who was forced to stand down within five days of selection after failing to declare serious financial problems.
This is the kind of campaign development that party staffers dread and the stuff of absolute nightmares for election agents. What’s that sound?
The wheels coming off one of the Tories’ most visible campaigns.
Palin-O-Meter
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12:00pm on February 1st, 2010
Mmmm. This raises some questions about all those feral conbloggers launching an appeal and an attack programme for this seat.
12:30pm on February 1st, 2010
All I can say is #KerryIN
3:36pm on February 1st, 2010
“Outstanding” and defauting on CCJs are two different things:
http://mtpt.wordpress.com/2010/02/01/outstanding-and-defaulting-or-an-introduction-to-ccjs-for-hacks/
3:51pm on February 1st, 2010
The CCJ may or may not be outstanding (if it is the latter then CCHQs ‘no comment’ response is senseless media suicide) however creditors don’t escalate their dispute with debtors to the courts as soon as they miss a single payment/deadline.
To avoid the extra time and expense involved with a CCJ it is reasonable to assume that whichever body was owed this money went through some process of trying to recover it without success – it is in this sense that Mrs Shafi has “defaulted”.
4:18pm on February 1st, 2010
How is it reasonable to assume that?
Given the potential implications, which this post indicates you are clearly aware of, don’t you think you should perhaps do a bit more research?
7:50am on February 12th, 2010
This is disguesting realy, I don’t beleive this that someone can owe that much. some kind of game is being played with you adeela, but you don’t worry, keep going and hopefully when you will get there then everyone will be fine with you. We are with you
7:57am on February 12th, 2010
Kerrrrrrrrrry you woooooooont caaaaaarrrrrrrrryyyy…….. Kerrryyyy ouuutt
7:52am on March 1st, 2010
#KerryIn
Adeela Shafi cannot be trusted
Join the #AdeelaBLOCKOUT campaign