Mr Brown had no discussion or communication with Geoffrey Robinson MP over the flat’s purchase or its financing.”Any suggestion of any impropriety in the purchase of the flat is entirely without foundation.”Mr Robinson was on the board of AGB Research’s parent company, AGB International, between l988 and 1990 – two years before the flat purchase, according to The Sunday Times.He was not available for comment last night.Mr Heathcoat-Amory told PA News: “This latest revelation confirms the depth of the financial relationship between the late Robert Maxwell and New Labour.”It’s now been shown that Gordon Brown is part of this network of money and favours.”It cannot be a coincidence that one of the failed Maxwell companies, chaired by Geoffrey Robinson MP, went bankrupt, and one of its properties, a flat in Westminster, was bought by Gordon Brown MP, also a close friend of Geoffrey Robinson MP, and who was later made Paymaster General in the Treasury.”We need a full, independent and public inquiry into the murky relationship between the disgraced Labour tycoon Robert Maxwell and present-day Labour ministers, in particular Gordon Brown.”. Chancellor Gordon Brown was today defending his purchase of an exclusive London flat from one of the failed companies of the late disgraced tycoon Robert Maxwell. Chancellor Gordon Brown was today defending his purchase of an exclusive London flat from one of the failed companies of the late disgraced tycoon Robert Maxwell.
Mr Brown insisted there had been nothing improper in the flat purchase, made after Mr Maxwell’s death sent his sprawling business empire crashing into a series of business failures.The Chancellor also denied there was any link between his buying the flat, for £130,000 in 1992, and millionaire businessman and fellow Labour MP Geoffrey Robinson, even though Mr Robinson had once been involved with the company that sold it.But shadow treasury chief secretary David Heathcoat-Amory said there must now be a “full, independent and public inquiry” into links between Mr Maxwell – once a major donor to Labour – and Government ministers.He said Mr Brown had been part of a “network of money and favours” around the tycoon, who died in mysterious circumstances in November 1991 after apparently falling from his yacht.Mr Brown bought the third floor apartment in Great Smith Street, near Westminster Abbey, from the administrators of the Maxwell-run TV polling firm AGB Research in December 1992 for £130,000, The Sunday Times disclosed today.Mr Robinson had been a director of AGB Research’s parent company until 1990, according to the paper.Estate agents told the newspaper that the full market price of the flat would have been between £163,000 and £212,000 at the time, although other experts said properties bought from administrators of failed companies or as a result of repossessions often sold below the full price.Last night Mr Brown flatly denied there had been any impropriety involved in the purchase of the flat.”It’s completely unfounded,” he told PA News.Later a spokesman for the Chancellor insisted: “Any suggestion of any impropriety in the purchase of the flat is entirely without foundation.”According to The Sunday Times, Mr Brown bought the flat from Arthur Andersen, the administrators responsible for dealing with the assets of failed Maxwell companies.He paid just under £100,000 in cash and raised a mortgage of more than £30,000 through the Abbey National, said the newspaper.The Chancellor still owns the flat – now worth about £300,000 – and uses it when he does not stay at the bachelor flat in nearby No 10 Downing Street.A spokesman for Mr Brown said: “The flat was bought in 1992 in the usual way, on the open market, through an estate agent and then solicitors and a building society mortgage.”The price paid was the market price Mr Brown had no contact at all with the vendors. This is undermining another important pillar of the British constitution.”If the Government wants a better spin machine they should raise political money and admit it is a political job rather than doing it at the taxpayers’ expense.”. The Knowledge Network project is based on Millbank’s “Line to Take” computer programme during the election. During the election it ensured every Labour press officer was signing from the same hymn sheet.John Redwood, the Tory spokesman on the environment, transport and the regions, said: “This is the politicisation of the civil service. Innovations have included: a Strategic Communications Unit to co-ordinate the Government’s media policy; a beefed-up Downing Street press office; and the creation of a rebuttal unit under Bill Bush, the former head of BBC Research.Last week the Government also admitted it was installing a new electronic information and rebuttal system developed by Joe McCrea, who was Frank Dobson’s special adviser at the Department of Health.

However, the system set up by Mike Granatt, the head of the Government Information Service, has failed to replace Millbank’s media brief.A government source said: “We want the products the unit produces revamped so they are readable and give the big picture. Joined-up Government means departments must know they are part of a daily news cycle, not acting in isolation.”New Labour has set about recreating in Downing Street the components that led to its election success. It is estimated that their employment will add close to £100,000 to Downing Street’s wages bill.Mr Campbell originally tried to transfer the Millbank men last year but was frustrated when civil service mandarins said they could provide a media monitoring service. Overall the Government now employs 71 special advisers and the wages bill has jumped from £1.9m a year to £4m.A Cabinet Office spokesman confirmed the duo had been appointed to advise the Prime Minister and would be covered by the model contract for special advisers.

Downing Street now employs 22 special advisers compared with eight under John Major’s premiership. Mr Campbell has poached Carl Shoben and Chris McShane from the party’s Millbank headquarters, where they were founding members of Labour’s fabled round-the-clock media monitoring team – nicknamed “The Ministry of Truth” after the propaganda unit in George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. The team revolutionised response times to stories and was dubbed the party’s early warning system by Mr Campbell, who still devours its early-morning media brief. The unit dovetailed with the party’s rapid rebuttal unit, spotting “bad” stories that had to be countered and “good” stories that had to be pushed.The appointments will rekindle allegations that New Labour is attempting to politicise the civil service, and provide ammunition to critics who claim the Government is spending taxpayers’ money on party political spin. Invests 56 per cent in UK equities; 14 per cent in overseas equities No CAT Allocation on £1,000: 100 per cent..