Mr George Galloway

30 November 2006

Q460  Sir Philip Mawer: I am not in the business of making charges, what I am in the business of doing—

Mr Galloway: It sounded like a charge to me.

Q461  Sir Philip Mawer:—is trying to get at the truth here as to what happened.

Mr McKay: Can I say something here as someone who was with George when we went to Iraq and discovered Mariam in the hospital, although I was not directly involved in the setting up of the Mariam Appeal. When we discussed the Appeal—and I will reiterate what surely you must bring out in your conclusion—it was obvious to us as a political campaign that it could not be a charity. The Charity Commission has retrospectively somehow decided that it should have been. We do not accept that there was any necessity to register it as a charity because it was explicitly, overwhelmingly and exclusively a political campaign.

Q462  Sir Philip Mawer: I know that is your position, Mr McKay, and I know, more importantly, that it is Mr Galloway's position and, indeed, the position of everyone I have spoken to who is connected with the Appeal, but it is not the position of the Charity Commission, it is as simple as that. There is a difference of view on that matter between you and them. If we can move on, continuing to address the evidence which relates to the Mariam Appeal. There are one or two specific things which Mr Halford says and, indeed, which arise out of the evidence also of Mr Al-Mukhtar. For example, Mr Halford says that you would ask him to send signed blank cheques to his Westminster office without explanation where they would be counter-signed by your parliamentary staff. I am putting these points to you because I think you ought to have the opportunity to respond to these points and put them on the record.

Mr Galloway: Can you give me that reference?

Q463  Sir Philip Mawer: If you can bear with me, I will find it. I am now looking at the evidence of Mr Halford. The first reference to parliamentary staff acting as counter-signatories is in paragraph 22 of Mr Halford's evidence. I know it is here, but if I can ask Alda to locate that reference and we will come back to the point.

Mr Galloway: It is a very important point. I did not pick that up in the papers that you sent me. If you say it is there I must believe you, but it is certainly untrue.

Q464  Sir Philip Mawer: It is untrue?

Mr Galloway: It is completely untrue that I instructed Halford to send blank cheques.

Q465  Sir Philip Mawer: To be counter-signed by your parliamentary staff?

Mr Galloway: Only a mad man would send blank cheques through the post that were signed. If that assertion is to be made, he will have to say who counter-signed the blank cheques, will he not?

Q466  Sir Philip Mawer: He said by your parliamentary staff.

Mr Galloway: Who? He will have to give you the names and you will have to interview them because that is a very serious charge. He is alleging that a member of my parliamentary staff counter-signed a blank cheque and sent it in the post to an account with hundreds of thousands of pounds in it which could have been opened by the postman or anyone else and stolen. That is a very serious charge.

Q467  Sir Philip Mawer: I am not sure he is necessarily saying they were sent in the post, he is saying that they were sent.

Mr Galloway: You did say "sent". How else could you send them?

Q468  Sir Philip Mawer: They might have been sent by hand. I take it there was frequent interaction with your parliamentary staff.

Mr Galloway: If you will forgive me, I think we should pause to find this particular charge because it is very important.

Q469  Sir Philip Mawer: There are other matters which I want to touch on that I can point you to immediately.

Mr Galloway: I have now speed-read it admittedly for a second time and I did not find it and if it is being said—

Q470  Sir Philip Mawer: It is.

Mr Galloway: —then he will have to tell you who counter-signed blank cheques and sent them back to him.

Q471  Sir Philip Mawer: Let me cover that in a subsidiary letter to you because that too is obviously important. There are other matters which are certainly referred to in the record that you have in front of you which I want you to have the opportunity to respond to. These occur towards the end of the document, in particular in paragraph 68 of the document. Mr Halford asserts that you asked that your expenses were made out to Dr Abu-Zayyad, your former wife.

Mr Galloway: Please, may I look at that. Paragraph eight says: "When he received bills or invoices he had written cheques and sent them off to co-signatories". That is rather different from the statement you made.

Q472  Sir Philip Mawer: He said he sent them off to co-signatories. My understanding is that they were also sent in the manner I described. That is my understanding from him; it has not come out of my own imagination.

Mr Galloway: All right, but in the document it does not say that.

Q473  Sir Philip Mawer: I will produce the chapter and verse for you, as I have said, and I will write to you on that matter as well as the other matter.

Mr Galloway: It is an extraordinary thing.

Q474  Sir Philip Mawer: Can I refer you to something which is in paragraph 68. He says there: "Mr Galloway asked that his expenses were made out to Dr Abu-Zayyad and were sent to their joint account at the Co-Operative Bank in Glasgow".

Mr Galloway: Dr Abu-Zayyad tabulated the receipts on which the expense claim was based and gave them to Mr Halford. It was a joint account. There was clearly no intention to deceive, otherwise the money would have gone into a wholly different account. It was a joint account, so it made no difference in whose name the cheque was made out. She was in charge of submitting my expenses to Mr Halford for reimbursement and that is what happened.

Q475  Sir Philip Mawer: Were you a co-signatory on that account?

Mr Galloway: On the joint account?

Q476  Sir Philip Mawer: Yes, on the joint account.

Mr Galloway: Yes.

Q477  Sir Philip Mawer: Was that an account at the Co-Operative Bank in Glasgow?

Mr Galloway: Yes.

Q478  Sir Philip Mawer: The records which I have seen of the financial arrangements for the Mariam Appeal, that is bank records of payments in and out, indicate that payments totalling the sum of £13,750 were made during 2000 to somebody called Elaine Laing or E M Laing or E Laing. Do you know who that person is because Mr Halford told me there was no such person on the staff of the Appeal?

Mr Galloway: That is a very serious matter because if Mr Halford does not know who E Laing is then we may be on to something quite big here. I have never heard of Elaine Laing or E Laing or anyone called Laing except for the former Secretary of State for Scotland. If she was paid by cheque, the cheque will be in the handwriting of Mr Halford.

Q479  Sir Philip Mawer: You have no idea who that person is?

Mr Galloway: I have never heard of this person.