For Lord Bramall, justice will have to wait
Shares in Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe have been falling, not least in the media
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Your support makes all the difference.If you want to know why the police will not apologise for allowing the foulest of smears to hang over a heroic 92-year-old war veteran, just consider what would happen if they did.
They would have to admit that the claims of his accuser, “Nick”, of his participation in a Westminster abuse ring, turn out to be legally worthless. MPs may have paid for sex with rent boys and girls. There may have been sex parties at Dolphin Square. Nick may have been abused by someone in the army. But ... Lord Bramall? It has as much logic as Woody Allen’s celebrated philosophical dictum: “Socrates is a man. All men are mortal. Therefore all men are Socrates.”
The police plan to speak to Lord Bramall, presumably to explain how his name came to their attention, but not until Operation Midland, its paedophile investigation, is over. But even if Nick’s evidence on Bramall makes him an unreliable witness (and you cannot have à la carte credibility), they are still uncertain. For all their digging, they can’t be sure that the former Tory MP Harvey Proctor didn’t attend Elm Guest House in south-west London (where others certainly did commit a chilling crime), although it remains an article of faith for some – though emphatically not me – that he did.
And even if Proctor could prove that negative, and that the supposed “guest list” is no such thing, they have to exhaust all other avenues (about other people, including Lord Brittan) to insure themselves against charges of a cover-up. Imagine the fuss if they carried on investigating the late Leon Brittan, but cleared Proctor. That would display more judgement and/or nerve than the police have shown hitherto.
And if they apologised, would they dare prosecute Nick for wasting police time? And what about the future of Met Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe? Until now, most of the blame has stuck to hapless Deputy Assistant Commissioner Steve Rodhouse, who has moved out of the firing line, and Assistant Commissioner Patricia Gallan, who stood in when the commissioner was away. His term expires in September, and this is surely not a great time to be asking for a vote of confidence. He wants two more years and Mayor Boris Johnson wants him to have them. The Mayor is thought not to have consulted Sadiq Khan or Zac Goldsmith, one of whom will be Hogan-Howe’s boss after May.
But shares in Sir Bernard have been falling, not least in the media. The Daily Mail, with which Hogan-Howe once had a fruitful relationship, is unimpressed with his move from the provinces, and The Sun, smarting from the Met’s pursuit of phone-hackers, ran a two-page spread recently calling for his head. The decision needs the approval of Theresa May, the Home Secretary, who is thought much less keen. Discussions are “ongoing” and the Mayor is sending his recommendation to May this week. With all that going on, rightly or wrongly Lord Bramall is going to have to wait.
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