Tim Razzall Emphatically says he knew nothing
Pic courtesy Liberal Democrats
Sir David Williams, former lb dem leader of Richmond Council – pic courtesy: richmond.gov.ukThe Met Police’s official acknowledgement to Channel Four’s Dispatches programme that Cyril Smith visited the notorious Elm House guest house in Barnes in south-west London – which is alleged to be used by paedophiles raises serious questions for the Liberal Democrats.
So far attention has been centred on former Liberal leaders, David Steel. Nick Clegg and Sir Menzies Campbell,the latter who was shown (possibly unfairly) to be heaping praise on Cyril Smith at his funeral.
But the real Liberal Democrats who should be quizzed are Baroness Tonge, Lord Razzall and Sir David Williams on the scandalous affair that allowed Cyril Smith to sexually assault young boys.
They were the Liberal members of Richmond Council in the aftermath of highly publicised police raid on Elm Guest House and responsible – along with the previous Tory administration – for the safe keeping of children in the council’s Grafton Close children’s home.
Sir David is so much in denial that he believes that the current prosecutions by the Met Police of a senior member of council staff are only being undertaken to please the press.
Lord Razzall, who later moved a motion to sack Louis Minster, director of social services, who was in charge of Richmond’s social services at the time of the alleged abuse, told me at the time – that he couldn’t remember why he moved the motion.
However for the record he says emphatically:” I had no knowledge of the raid you refer to which in any event predated our taking control of the Richmond Council and I had never been a member of the relevant committee or a reader of the News of the World.”
“I did remember that the Chair of Social Services had lost confidence in the Director as often happened on a change of political control of a local council. You did not raise with my any issue of child abuse and indeed had you done so I would have told you that the Directors’ retirement had nothing to do with the events you referred to in your blog. Indeed had you raised them with me it would have been the first time I was aware of them.”
“In the current climate there can hardly be a more serious libel than to allege that I may have covered up Cyril Smith’s visits to Elm Guest House so that he could go on to abuse others.
“For the record, I only became aware of the allegations about Cyril Smith in 2013, fifteen years after I ceased to be a Richmond Councillor.”
Jenny Tonge: Silence
pic courtesy: The Guardian
Obviously all three can at the moment shelter behind the sub judice rules but when the trial is over next summer – they should be pursued to provide an explanation. At last Tim Razzall has made his views clear now.
But one must at least ask – did they know about Cyril Smith’s visits to Elm Guest House?-
Westminster Confidential 
Pingback: Paedophile MP Cyril Smith: Questions for Jenny Tonge and Tim Razzall | theneedleblog
We’ve had some dealings with Sir David and his colleagues when we were trying to stop controlled parking in our street. The whole lot of them are suspect and the cover-up and corruption at the council knows no bounds. It was a foretaste of the horrors being perpetrated by the Coalition. Since when was a minority deemed a majority? Since the council decided it wanted to run rough-shod over residents’ desires, probably so as to line their own pockets. We no longer have democracy in this country.
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I was given detailed information by a LBRuT officer who took people to a brothel in Barnes. He too was disgusted.
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So do we still have faith in fernbridge David? We still await the arrest of two Tories and the people who ran RAWRO, one of whom lives within five miles of where fernbridge operate from?
Or do we start to threaten the state that we all go public with the evidence not yet put out there?
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This is a massive wake up call the people of the UK about our morally corrupt MPs – they are supposed to represent the people of the UK and we have had enough of the cover ups, the corruption (expenses), the self-imposed pay rises that buck the national trend and the way they protect each other when they are involved in such heinous crimes as CSA. I suggest starting interviewing a former Home secretary that failed to investigate Cyril Smith; failed to ban PIE asap and has no recollection of being handed the Dickens’ Dossier. Is ignorance no offence in a court of law? “I do not recollect any such dossier.” Time for the back-scratching to stop. There are seven to nine times as many investigating officers on the phone hacking investigation as there are on Fernbridge (seven officers) says it all. Disgusting. There will be a time to go public.
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The Politicians at eLBruTy knew all the abuse at Grafton Boys Home. One of the Lib-Demagogue councillors took the bait from a disgrunted officer and replied on the Richmond Watchdog Forum – Councillor Cardy in 2001, yes 2001, confimed online that Stingemore had been convicted in 1983 and that boys were taken from his Grafton carehome to a brothel in Barnes. Well placed councillors also knew about the porn ex-councillor Tony Mollet was found to have on his council laptop before he resigned as a councillor and a governor of a local primary school, despite the facts know to many Councillor Elengorn defended him by saying it was adult porn…yeh we know better as stated in the emails from Robert Hancock (late of the DAvid Lewis Foundation – now thats a story) and Richard Mellor
More? what about the a social services officer who was forced out of his employent at Richmond in 2001 after he was found to have extreme images of children on his council PC after colleugues and BT officers complained. What did the Richmond plods do…nothing, as they have always done when protecting their fellow masonic travellers from Cole Park Lodge.
Snow White and her two dwarves may have collective memory loss but many decent people do not have that problem.
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Reblogged this on theneedleblog.
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@ the scandalous affair that allowed Cyril Smith to sexually assault young boys @
Elm House was widely regarded as being a place of welcome for homosexual men to meet with their partners of choice in an unthreatening atmosphere… viz your own blog:
*Mr Kasir, a central figure in the scandal involving investigations into child sex abuse at the guest house, was convicted with his wife, Carole, of running a gay brothel after the police raid on the place in 1982*
https://davidhencke.wordpress.com/2013/02/20/will-elm-guest-house-man-quit-britain/
Cyril being homosexual seems to be being glossed over here?
All the other alleged paedophilic behaviour seems to be men and boys.
This is a gay thing, right?
Have you interviewed any regular users of Elm House? At least one has visited my Blog comments and described Elm House thus:
“The difference with Elm House ?..it was a budget hotel where people could take a guest and it was gay friendly. How do I know ?. When I lived in Shropshire for 2 years on a contract job I regularly stayed at Elm House on visits to London just as I stayed at gay or gay friendly hotels in Brighton. It wasn’t a den of enquity 95% of the time but probably every now and then a guest may take a rent boy (not me) back there because no questions were asked- mainly because one received a front door key and there was no manned reception desk to by-pass. Undoubtedly some of those rent boys may have been under aged, so many were in Piccadilly at the time.”
Seems the picture you are painting might be lop-sided as well as one-sided Mr. Hencke.
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I see your point. But at that time because people were terrified of being outed it is quite clear that you got two different groups at Elm House and other places. There were gay couples who would now go to a Brighton hotel without anybody taking any notice but there was also a dark side involving young boys. Yes we have talked to survivors who were taken there at a very young age and whose description of events is very different. I have never taken the so called Mary Moss list at face value. In fact the story about Elm Guest House came originally from quite a different set of people, who are neither part of the gay scene nor its survivors, from former concerned officials at the London borough of Richmond who believed the whole thing had been covered up for years.
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The point is that this ‘dark side’ was only claimed in the late 80s once the compo bandwagon and PTSD etc got underway and there were all kinds of ‘ring ‘ theories.
I’d like to see where and when these ‘officials’ got their stuff from – was it the same toilet seat?
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@ the story about Elm Guest House came originally from quite a different set of people, who are neither part of the gay scene nor its survivors, @
*survivors* of the gay scene?
Interesting turn of phrase, quite Freudian in fact.
I’ll steer my correspondent and his fellow ex-residents in the direction of your writings. Perhaps they may feel they need a voice too, and you’ll get more readers so everyone benefits.
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Moor Larkin, I’d be quite happy if you put other people in contact.
The reason why I used survivors is not a Freudian slip up, but the fact people who have sexually abused as kids in Richmond and at Roman Catholic schools hate being called victims. As for the gay issue, the ones I have talked to are mainly straight as adults, others are gay. If you want to look up a very good group that is fighting to bring justice for a number of people who were sexually abused as kids, go to the http://www.lanternproject.org.uk/ website
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@Moor Larkin, I’d be quite happy if you put other people in contact@
I doubt they’ll want to “make contact”, but I daresay they’ll be fascinated to see more of the roots of the sort of “journalism” that lies behind the current paedo-panic, which surely exceeds anything Rupert Murdoch and the News of the World could ever have dreamed of.
@As for the gay issue, the ones I have talked to are mainly straight as adults@
Isn’t this a bit weird? It was a “gay brothel” – you said so yourself. Why would “straight” people be anywhere near it? Are you sure about these folks ? Do you have any sort of old-fashioned “evidence” from them, confirmed times and places etc…… or is it all just stories you’ve been told, like with the Savile tales told to other journalists recently?
The other thing that baffles me is that Elm House was well-known to coppers back then and therefore it would be just as well-known to journalists from such as the News of the World, back then. How exactly was it that a 32-stone MP, who was possibly one of the most familair political celebrities of the day was able to sneak in and out of this “gay brothel” in south London, with his booming Lancahsire voice and enormous bulk, without being spotted. Were all the Hacks in on the conspiracy too? Back when Queers and Homo’s were the News, rather than Paedo’s?
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moor larkin
I am too baffled by your response. Given the allegations re Elm Guest House and charges involving Grafton Close involve kids as young as 9,10,12 going there at the time it would be quite obvious to me that at that age they would not know whether they were gay or straight, unless you think otherwise.
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@Anonymous
I’m being obtuse?
Truths are not mutually exclusive?
How not?
Hencke says it was a “gay brothel” Right?
That means it was for gay folk.
Why would straight guys be there?
Why is it little boys specifically all the time?
What is this “paedo” schtick? Is it a third sex?
There was no attempt to address the rational question I asked, viz.
“Elm House was well-known to coppers back then and therefore it would be just as well-known to journalists from such as the News of the World, back then. How exactly was it that a 32-stone MP, who was possibly one of the most familiar political celebrities of the day was able to sneak in and out of this “gay brothel” in south London, with his booming Lancashire voice and enormous bulk, without being spotted. Were all the Hacks in on the conspiracy too?”
Cyril being gay would have been manna from heaven for NoW back then
Cyril with rent boys would have been a smash Sunday seller
Private Eye stirred the pot over the spanking allegations made up-North about Cyril so every press-hound on Fleet Street had his scent in their nostrils.
@How would your correspondent know what else went on except in his own room during his visits?@
I frequently have stayed in proper hotels and I have known exactly what was going on in the room next to mine. Elm House was just an ordinary house. The idea that kids could be being forced into horrid things in one room while guests slept blissfully in another room is completely absurd. Especially when you consider Cyril Smith was 32 stones.
This story has more holes in it than the ceiling below Cyril’s room would have had if all this trash-talk was true.
MI5 and the gay politicians?
This is Political Journalism in 2013?
Christ Almighty.
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@ I am too baffled by your response. Given the allegations re Elm Guest House and charges involving Grafton Close involve kids as young as 9,10,12 @
Grafton Close is a whole different kettle of fish.
I’m struggling to grasp how you can be baffled. The dots are very easy to join. Elm House is a “gay brothel” you said. If children of these ages were being taken there, who would be awaiting them…. in a “gay brothel”?
Why are you so wary of accepting the inevitable consequence of your story?
If you have truth firmly in your grasp, surely this is an obvious feature. It seems very obvious to me. My gay correspondent talks about Elm House as a very innocuous and pleasant place for him to escape from the occasionally antagonistic world back then. You are painting it like it was some kind of modern Hades. Can both sides be true simultaneously?
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You seem deliberately obtuse to me. Mr Hencke is referring to the children who are now grown up, not the men who were awaiting them at the “gay brothel”, which also provided your correspondent with a pleasant place to escape from an antagonistic world back then. These truths are not mutually exclusive. Nobody is suggesting that Elm Guest House only catered for paedophiles. How would your correspondent know what else went on except in his own room during his visits?
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@Anonymous
I’m being obtuse?
Truths are not mutually exclusive?
How not?
Hencke says it was a “gay brothel” Right?
That means it was for gay folk.
Why would straight guys be there?
Why is it little boys specifically all the time?
What is this “paedo” schtick? Is it a third sex?
There was no attempt to address the rational question I asked, viz.
“Elm House was well-known to coppers back then and therefore it would be just as well-known to journalists from such as the News of the World, back then. How exactly was it that a 32-stone MP, who was possibly one of the most familiar political celebrities of the day was able to sneak in and out of this “gay brothel” in south London, with his booming Lancashire voice and enormous bulk, without being spotted. Were all the Hacks in on the conspiracy too?”
Cyril being gay would have been manna from heaven for NoW back then
Cyril with rent boys would have been a smash Sunday seller
Private Eye stirred the pot over the spanking allegations made up-North about Cyril so every press-hound on Fleet Street had his scent in their nostrils.
@How would your correspondent know what else went on except in his own room during his visits?@
I frequently have stayed in proper hotels and I have known exactly what was going on in the room next to mine. Elm House was just an ordinary house. The idea that kids could be being forced into horrid things in one room while guests slept blissfully in another room is completely absurd. Especially when you consider Cyril Smith was 32 stones.
This story has more holes in it than the ceiling below Cyril’s room would have had if all this trash-talk was true.
MI5 and the gay politicians?
This is Political Journalism in 2013?
Christ Almighty.
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Everything is completely out of hand. Other than the alleged ‘toilet seat’ evidence – where from and when? there is still nothing to conclusive about Smith visiting the Elm. The list we know is a retrospective fake. There’s certainly no evidence objectively that Smith was involved with underage boys at the Elm. How come Carol Kasir the desperate ‘deep throat’ said that she had no knowledge of any underage activity at the Elm? You may wish to know that the putting of names and photos to vulnerable people was something employed by journalists and social workers at this time (1988 – 1989) when Fay and Moss were in contact with Kasir, as in the Nottingham fantasy SRA Broxtowe case.http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~dlheb/Default.htm
essential reading.
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Margaret Jervis, you seem to have an answer to everything, so perhaps you can tell everyone why the Staffordshire Pindown child abuse report has been deliberatly taken out of circulation, and the victims of the abuse been treated like criminals?
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Sorry, I said like criminals, actually the Pindown victims have been treated far worse than criminals, as at least criminals have the legal right to defend themselves, Pindown victims on the other hand have the anti Terrorism Act gagging and surveillance powers used against them. Care to explain why that is?
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I’d also like to know what really happened to Richard Wise. Don’t pretend not to know who HE was, Margaret Jervis. He definatly didn’t die the way the local newspaper said he did – he was fit as a fiddle, no terminal cancer at all.
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Richard Wise was silenced for the very same reason Stuart Syvret was. The very same exact reason, Richard in Staffordshire, Stuart in Jersey.
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my understanding of EGH (and I am by no means an authority on the subject…) was that it was primarily a gay haunt. Certainly it was a nice house in a respectable area of London – I don’t think anybody has suggested that it was some filthy den – at least decor wise! . Allegedly young boys were brought there but this was not its sole activity and I don’t think its been suggested otherwise. Additionally am I correct in saying that the alleged abuse largely took place in a sauna room?
The involvement of spartacus and RAWRO seems to suggest that there were plans to have this “side operation” to have greater emphasis. There are parallels to be drawn with the guest house involved in the bullfinch case in Oxford – girls were brought to a guest house (the name escapes me) to be abused, but it was not the case that it was used exclusively for this. There are some important differences however in that I don’t think it likely that the manager of bullfinch guesthouse was aware of what was going on. Same cannot be said for the Kazirs, imo.
I guess what I am trying to say is that my impression of EGH is similar to those rumored bars where if you ask for the right wine you can get cocaine.
Would appreciate any clarification/ criticism of what I have written here.
Thanks
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I’ve just recently discovered this website (although I’ve read the journalist’s writings before) and about a month ago I discovered the website of Moor Larkin (above).
I cannot know the truth about Cyril Smith or Jimmy Savile but I have grave reservations on what has been reported for the following reasons:
For nearly 8 years I worked for a security company that provided casual security for the BBC to supplement their full time staff. We were often deployed to the Shepherds Bush Empire Theatre for the taping of BBC shows.
What struck me about the Savile ‘Exposure’ program was the claim persons said they were abused during the recordings of Savile shows at the BBC TV Centre. Yet no Savile TV programs were EVER recorded at the BBC TV Centre. This claim has been often repeated.
One person making this mistake could be understood but many making the claim is highly suspicious.
Moor Larkin has provided ample evidence of this but any journalist- and not one single one has- could easily check out this fact with the BBC.
Before I did security work for the BBC i always assumed that the BBC TV Centre was the centre of the BBC world. Yet I was being sent to places like Pinewood Studios and Shepherds Bush where shows were filmed. I only once did security for a corporate conference at the Centre.
Why have completely inaccuracies claims like this been allowed to be perpetuated when they are the sort of falsehoods that would get a court case thrown out had Savile ever faced a court?
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OMG, not Larkin, and Jervis and the mysterious other larkin blog dweller. Jervis is just some OAP looking to boost her earnings by ambulance chasing for Chris Saltrese ( defend a paedo today ) .Larkin is not sane, and has a selection of anon guests on his blog who back up his various fantasy stories, like the one in Scotland who knew savile and what he had done every day since birth lol- quite remarkable, if wholly unconvincing, and never heard of again.
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Julia. nothing wrong in being an OAP, so am I!
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Coming soon chaps
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