Cash-for-honours: Blair aides await fate as inquiry ends

Police have finally handed over their findings in the Cash for Honours scandal to the Crown Prosecution Service and it is understood that they are calling for charges to be brought against two of Tony Blair's closest allies.

As we are now merely weeks away from Tony Blair announcing his departure, I think it is safe to say that this is not the exit that he would have wanted.

It is understood that Lord Levy, the Labour Party chief fundraiser, and No 10's director of government relations, Ruth Turner, have been singled out in the 216-page dossier. A further 6,300 pages of supporting documents have also been sent by the Metropolitan Police to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

It follows a 13-month inquiry by Scotland Yard into the alleged awarding of peerages to Labour-supporting businessmen in return for secret loans.

Levy and Turner have always maintained their innocence. It is understood that the Crown Prosecution Service might take up to three months to make the decision on whether or not to bring any prosecutions.

So Blair will almost certainly leave office with this scandal hanging over his administration's head.

The rumours are that he will "announce his departure to the media on Wednesday May 9, triggering the Labour leadership succession. Weather permitting, he will tell us his decision on the Downing Street lawn."

A mere eight months after the backbench rebellion that forced him to say he would leave within the year and he will be gone. And he'll be gone with two of his team possibly looking at prosecutions being brought against them.

It'll be a tawdry end to what should have been, could have been, a great Labour premiership.

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Tags: Cash for Honours, Blair, Levy, Ruth Turner