Charles in Charge Part III

This is the third and final part of a three part series of a case study in self promotion.

Part 1 is here and Part 2 is here.

In Part 3 we look again at the video surveillance bill, and specifically Chauvel’s SOP. As I had previously blogged, his much vaunted SOP was a cut and paste from the wrong version of the Search & Surveillance Bill.

Now in Parliament Chauvel refers to the SOP “I have drafted” (at around 12 mins), and in fact told his colleagues that he had stayed up until 3 am working on it.

But when it turned out the SOP was based on the wrong version of the bill, Chauvel blogged correspondence with the Office of the Clerk, blaming them for the errors in the bill. So it is Chauvel’s SOP when it is about the credit, and the Office of the Clerk’s bill when it is about the blame. And the only sign of working at 3 am is an e-mail at 10 pm asking for the bill to be redrafted.

What surprised me is that a former partner in a major law firm didn’t even pick up the drafting errors. It is not unusual to use the OOTC to draft amendments, but you expect MPs (especially those who are lawyers) to check any SOP in their name.

Now this incident is by itself no big issue. But when you combine it with the other two issues of authoring letters to the editor praising yourself, and laying down bottom lines *after* you have been told what the Govt has agreed to, it does all fit together into a pattern of an MP who is absolutely obsessed with getting the recognition he thinks he is due.

I’ve been happy to help with getting him the recognition he is due.