Why do Ashington people continue voting this man in as their MP.This case below happened years ago and apparently he is now Chairman in the Labour Party.


Labour chairman Ian Lavery refuses FIFTEEN times to explain why the mineworkers' union paid off his mortgage
• Labour chairman Ian Lavery was given £165,000 from National Union of Miners
• Included payment towards his mortgage and redundancy payment in 2010
• This comes after campaign video accusing Tories of stealing the miners pension
• Lavery got ‘termination payments’ of £89,887 when he left to become an MP
• He was lent £72,500 by the NUM benevolent fund to buy a property in 2017
• Labour's chairman refused 15 times to explain why the National Union of Mineworkers had paid off his mortgage.
• Ian Lavery was confronted by Michael Crick from Mail+ about why he had received £165,000 from the NUM which included payment towards his mortgage and a redundancy payment when he became an MP in 2010.
• It came days after he featured in a campaign video by Labour that accused the Tories of ‘stealing the miners’ pension fund’.
• It criticised how, when the coal industry was privatised in 1994, it was agreed that if there was surplus in the Mineworkers’ Pension Scheme it would be shared between its members and the Government.
• Mr Crick asked him whether he had ‘a bit of a cheek’ doing the video given the money he had received from the NUM. And he asked: ‘Couldn’t that money have been better spent on miners welfare?’ Mr Lavery replied: ‘Instead of coming here making this personal, concentrate on what the Labour Party have got to offer.’
• A 2017 report from the Certification Office, which regulates unions, showed that he was lent £72,500 by the NUM benevolent fund to buy a property.
• It was written off in 2007. It added that Mr Lavery, the former general secretary of the NUM’s Northumberland branch, and his wife kept £18,000 from an endowment policy on the property.
• The report also showed that Mr Lavery received union ‘termination payments’ of £89,887 when he left to become an MP.
• It said the union overpaid him £30,600 but, after a dispute, he volunteered to repay only £15,000.
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