John Poulson
John Garlick Llewellyn Poulson (14 April 1910 – 31 January 1993)[1] was a British architectural designer and businessman who caused a major political scandal when his use of bribery was disclosed in 1972. The highest-ranking figure to be forced out due to the scandal was Conservative Home Secretary Reginald Maudling. Poulson served a prison sentence, but continued to protest his innocence, claiming that he was "a man more sinned against than sinning".[2]
John Poulson
31 January 1993 (aged 82)
Architect
2 daughters
Family and early life[edit]
Poulson came from a strict Methodist family and inherited a strong faith which stressed the importance of self-help. He did badly at school and at Leeds College of Art but nevertheless was articled to a Pontefract firm of architects, Garside and Pennington. He left to found his own architecture practice with financial backing from his father.[1] He never registered with the ARCUK (Architects' Registration Council of the United Kingdom), later claiming "I was too busy to complete my examinations".[3] Poulson soon began to cultivate contacts in the local borough council and officials at the larger West Riding County Council. Work soon began to arrive and Poulson told friends that he was "on his way". Poulson also became politically involved with the National Liberals, although he never let political differences stop him from making "friends" who were in charge of commissioning public buildings. He was a Freemason.[4][5]
Overseas work[edit]
Poulson was increasingly interested in obtaining commissions outside Britain in the mid-1960s. This required making more contacts. The Conservative MP John Cordle had extensive contacts in West Africa and after helping on several small contracts, in 1965 became a consultant to Poulson. Cordle admitted that he had received £5,628 from Poulson's business.[16]
Maudling[edit]
Another contact was the then Shadow Commonwealth Secretary Reginald Maudling, whom Poulson knew from his National Liberal activities. Maudling was anxious to build up a business career to keep up his income and Poulson needed a big name as chairman of one of his companies, Construction Promotion. In 1966 Maudling accepted an offer to be chairman. In return, Maudling helped to bring pressure on the government of Malta to award a £1.5 million contract for the new Victoria Hospital on Gozo to Poulson.[17][18]
Financial trouble[edit]
Poulson's business model was initially highly successful and, at its apogee, had an annual turnover of £1 million;[15] he himself admitted to being a millionaire. However, it was consuming more contract work than was becoming available, and Poulson resorted to tackling these difficulties by bribing and corrupting local councillors, local authority officials and civil servants at all levels. This was an expensive strategy and Poulson later estimated that he "gave away" about £500,000 in the last few years of his involvement in the business.[19] As part of his attempts to gain attention, Poulson had become a local Commissioner of Taxes.[3]
On 31 December 1969, Poulson was formally removed from control of J.G.L. Poulson and Associates. On 9 November 1971, he filed his own bankruptcy petition, revealing debts of £247,000. The bankruptcy hearings in spring 1972 were assisted by Poulson's meticulous record-keeping which detailed his payments and gifts. Poulson's generosity drew the comment from Muir Hunter QC during the bankruptcy proceedings that "[i]n fact, Mr Poulson, you were distributing largesse like Henry VIII".[3] The bankruptcy hearing also revealed Poulson's love for a lavish lifestyle and his penchant for rubbing shoulders with senior figures in the establishment. This desire to show his financial superiority over others only served to highlight his true character as a lonely, friendless and insecure person. One of Poulson's biggest creditors was the Inland Revenue to which he owed around £200,000.[3] Whilst the Revenue were pressing Poulson for payment of this amount, he was himself presiding over debt hearings in Wakefield in his role as a Commissioner of Inland Revenue.[3]
It swiftly became apparent that Poulson was at the centre of a massive corruption scandal, and in July 1972, the Metropolitan Police began an investigation for fraud. This precipitated the resignation of Reginald Maudling, then Home Secretary, who was notionally in charge of the police.[20]
Dénouement[edit]
On 22 June 1973, Poulson was arrested and charged with corruption in connection with the award of building contracts. The trial at Leeds Crown Court lasted 52 days, and cost an estimated £1.25 million. Defending Poulson, Donald Herrod QC , said: "He has nothing to live for and his abiding fear is that he will never complete his sentence because of ill health".[21] Donald Herrod later described his client as "hypocritical, self-righteous and perhaps something of a megalomaniac".[21]
Following the trial which was widely reported in the press, he was convicted on 11 February 1974 of fraud and jailed for five years (later increased to seven years). Sentencing him, the judge called Poulson an "incalculably evil man".[3] For his part, Poulson denied the charges, saying "I have been a fool, surrounded by a pack of leeches. I took on the world on its own terms, and no one can deny I once had it in my fist".[3]
Many of his contacts, in particular T. Dan Smith[15] and George Pottinger, were similarly convicted and gaoled, though not the three MPs: it was found that there was a legal loophole through which members of parliament could not be considered as in charge of public funds. The Poulson scandals did much to force the House of Commons to initiate a Register of Members' Interests. A subsequent Select Committee inquiry which reported in 1977 found that all three had indulged in "conduct inconsistent with the standards which the House is entitled to expect from its Members".[22]
After serving periods in Armley Gaol, Wakefield and Oakham prisons, Poulson was released on 13 May 1977 from Lincoln Prison after Lord Longford had appealed on his behalf. Longford had successfully argued that to keep a sick man in gaol was an "indefensible cruelty".[7] His bankruptcy was discharged, with creditors receiving 10p in the pound, in 1980. A condition of the discharge was that half the proceeds of his autobiography would go to his creditors; the resulting book, The Price, gives his side of the corruption scandal and maintains his innocence. Only a few copies of the book remain in circulation as it was withdrawn and pulped by the publishers through fear of libel actions.[23]
Poulson died in the General Infirmary in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, on 31 January 1993. His wife and two daughters survived him.[23]
Contributions[edit]
Among buildings designed by Poulson are the City House (1962) and International Pool (1965–1968),[7] both in Leeds, and Forster House in Bradford, which was demolished in 2005 as part of the Forster Square redevelopment.[24] The International Pool in Leeds was closed in 2007 and razed to the ground in 2009. The site is now used for car parking.[25]
In an indirect way, Poulson did make a contribution to the UK's broadcasting culture. A special edition of the investigative ITV series World in Action, The Friends and Influence of John L Poulson, became a cause célèbre in the debate about the power of Britain's television regulators to interfere with broadcast journalism. The Poulson programme was banned by the then regulator, the ITA, even though its members had not seen it. A furious debate followed in which newspapers united in calling for an end to such "censorship".[26]
Granada Television, the makers of World in Action, broadcast a blank screen as a protest against the banning. There was some irony in this: the editor of World in Action was Raymond Fitzwalter, who earlier, as deputy news editor of the Telegraph & Argus in Bradford, had led an investigation into Poulson's activities, which the newspaper published. Eventually, after the film was shown to the ITA, it was transmitted on 30 April 1973, three months late, and under a different title, The Rise and Fall of John Poulson.[27]
The 1996 BBC television drama serial Our Friends in the North, written by Peter Flannery, contains a character, John Edwards (played by Geoffrey Hutchings), who is closely based on Poulson. One of the reasons the production took so long to reach the screen—Flannery had originally written it for the stage in 1982—was the fear of the BBC that Poulson and others fictionalised in the drama might take legal action. In the event, the deaths of Poulson and T. Dan Smith in 1993 finally allowed the production to commence.[28]