Would this account for the unprecedented high level of political support?

by Guest 05.09.11 7:58

Thanks to the Portuguese Police and the release of the guest lists, we have now come to piece together, that one of the people socialising with Kate and Gerry McCann that week, is very closely related to the Right Honourable Margaret Hodge MBE, MP.

Margaret and the late Sir Henry Hodge, were extremely close friends of Tony and Cherie Blair. It was the Hodges who persuaded the Blair’s to move to their street in Islington in the 1990’s and several of the strategy meetings in the early days of New Labour, took place at the Hodges’ house.

According to Kate’s dairy, SUNDAY, JUNE 17: 'Cherie Blair (then the Premier's wife) phoned to find out how we were. We talked about everything in general, including about them leaving Number 10. She agreed as well to make a 20-second video clip for our broadcast on YouTube about Madeleine and children who have disappeared. I also had the chance to speak to Tony (then Prime Minister) who told me that we weren't to hesitate to ask him if there was something he could do to help'.

Influential people, famous names, huge amounts of money and someone in the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s no wonder this investigation was a bit of a non starter.

According to the Daily Telegraph today, Tony Blair is the Godfather of one of Rupert Murdoch’s daughters. Well, well, well...

by **tigger** 05.09.11 8:05

I think that's Kate name dropping again. I don't think the Hodge connection can account for much, especially since the main mover and shaker seems to have been Gordon Brown. Gerry worked for GB's brother on something? I would think that's a stronger connection.
The way the phone conversation is reported, sounds to me like the usual things the Blairs would say to anyone, especially TB's closing remark, just the usual empty phrases one uses. Note that CB only promises to to a clip which included other lost children as well. So clearly they didn't seem keen to be closely associated with the McCanns.

The thing I find more worrying is the connection of the photographer who took such questionable pictures of Maddie, with Tony Blair. see the topic on photographs and memories.

by Guest 05.09.11 8:10

It has been reported that the Oppenheimer family are the 3rd richest family in the UK and where there is big money, there is always politics.

by Guest 05.09.11 8:16

Why would a member of the Oppenheimer family business Stemcor, be staying at a resort like Ocean Club?

by Guest 05.09.11 8:22

In 1994 after the death of Jo Richardson, Margaret Hodge won the Barking by-election. As a new MP, she co-nominated the candidature of Tony Blair, after the sudden death of John Smith and in 1998 she became a junior Minister.

In 2001 she took up the role of Minister for Universities, where she later sponsored the controversial Higher Education Act 2004.

In 2003 she was made Children’s Minister and was appointed to the Privy Council.

Privacy International awarded Margaret Hodge the 2004 ‘Big Brother Award’ for “Worst Public Servant” for her backing of controversial initiatives including the Universal Child Database.

In 2005 she was appointed Minister of State at Department of Works and Pensions.

On 27 June 2007, Margaret was appointed Minister of State at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, by the new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.

Following the cabinet reshuffle of 3 October 2008, it was announced that Margaret was “temporarily leaving Government on compassionate grounds of family illness and will return to Government in the spring”.

On 22 September 2009, Margaret was reappointed Minister of State, as Minister for Culture and Tourism and later succeeded by Ed Vaizey, Minister for Culture & Communications.

On 9 June 2010, she was elected Chair of the Public Accounts Committee.

by Guest 05.09.11 8:25

The company Stemcor, is the largest privately owned steel-trading corporation in the world, with an annual turnover £6.28 billion.

by Guest 05.09.11 8:41

The OppenheimerFund, is one of the worlds leading places for investment. Which is all the more interesting when you consider that another guest using the creche facilities at the Ocean Club that week, works for a London investment company.

by **Tony Bennett** 05.09.11 8:49

Stella wrote:Thanks to the Portuguese Police and the release of the guest lists, we have now come to piece together, that one of the people socialising with Kate and Gerry McCann that week, is very closely related to the Right Honourable Margaret Hodge MBE, MP.

REST SNIPPED

I think it's important for this discussion that we now identify the person closely related to Margaret ('Lady') Hodge who was at Praia da Luz with the McCanns that week, for his name is publicly available in the files: Mr Philip Martin Edmonds. He is Margaret Hodge's nephew.

Mr Edwards has a fascinating family history. Born on 31 August 1962 according to his entry on Geni.Com, he married Reina Hazenberg and they have three boys, all of whom were out with Philip in Praia da Luz for the week the McCanns were there. But not his wife Reina, so it seems. We also know from the Portuguese Police files that he mysteriously jetted off to Switzerland, where he lives, early on Friday morning (4 May 2011), apparnetly cutting short his holiday just as news was surfacing that a child had been abducted from Praia da Luz.

Visit the website of Stemcor.com, the world's largest steel company, with a turnover measured in billions, and Philip Edmonds' name again comes up as one of their 11-strong Board of Directors.

How did Philip Edmonds get so far? A clue is apparent from the same Stemcor.com website: Philips' Uncle Ralph - Ralph Oppenheimer - is also on the Stemcor Board.

Indeed, Stemcor, as a brief internet search reveals, is an Oppenheimer family business.

All this has come about because Philip's father, Herbert Edmonds, made a wise choice in marrying into the Oppenheimer family.

Hannah Oppenheimer was the eldest of five children of Hans Oppenheimer and his wife Lisbeth Hollitscher, an Austrian Jewess. Hans was born in Stuttgart, Germany but fled to Alexandria in the mid-1930s as Hitler's anti-Semitic Nazi regime was stepping up its persecution of Jews, in the lead-up to World War II.

His first four children, including Hannah, and of course her sister Margaret Eve Hodge, nee Oppenheimer, were all born in Alexandria, Egypt, Hodge being born on 8 September 1944 in Alexandria, Hannah three years later in Orpington, Kent. Hannah still lives in Kent (see below).

In the 1980s, Margaret Hodge did two things that made her famous (or infamous). She married Sir Henry Hodge (her second marriage), and became known as Margaret Hodge. And she became a prominent Labour Councillor in left-wing Islington, where she was later notorious for covering up extensive child abuse in what became known as the 'Islington Children's Home Scandal', fully exposed in the 1990s (there's a lot about this on the internet).

In 2003, despite this appalling record, Prime Minister Tony Blair made her Britain's first-ever 'Minister for Children' (!)

Lady Hodge inherited a substantial slice of the Oppenheimer fortune, and is one of Britain's wealthiest women; despite that, she claimed excessive Parliamentary expenses from us, the British taxpayers (see reports on the MPs' expenses scandal).

Philip's father and mother, Herbert and Hannah Edmonds, aged 81 and 74 resepctively, live in Bromley, Kent. Philip is beleived to be based in Switzerland.

Hannah Oppenheimer's father Hans was the son of Salomon Oppenheimer, born 1871 in Ohringen, west Germany, and in turn Salomon is the son of Abraham Oppenheimer, who in turn was the son of another Abraham Oppenheimer, from one of the many branches of this powerful German-Hewish family.

Edmonds is not an English name, it's an anglicised version of the German 'Emsheimer'. Philip Edmonds' father, Herbert Emsheimer, was born in Karlsruhe, wast Germany, in 1930, and the family changed their name to Edmonds on arriving in England.

Why Philip Edmonds should choose Praia da Luz as his choice of holiday venue for the week 28 April to 5 May 2007 is not known. And there is no explanation as to why Edmonds and his three sons jetted away from Praia da Luz on the morning of Friday 4 May 2007, just as the British public were tuning in to the news and learning that a British girl had been mysteriously abducted.

I wrote to Mr Edmonds recently about some of these matters and received this courteous but brief reply:

Dear Mr Bennett,

I am in receipt of your letter of 22 July regarding Madeleine McCann. I am sure you would appreciate that it would not be appropriate for me to comment too much, as we do not know each other, and I have no idea what your connection to the case is. However, I would also not want further conspiracy theories to fester by simply ignoring your letter.

Therefore, I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, which showed her in the background) was passed both to the police and to the McCanns at the time. Having been in Portugal at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance and seen all of the events first hand, there is not one shred of doubt in my mind that the events as reported were correct.

In fact one of the most terrible parts of this tragedy is that there are people out there who are questioning this, just adding further to the nightmare that the McCann family have suffered. I cannot imagine anything crueller.

I’m afraid I won’t enter into further correspondence on this matter with you.

Yours sincerely,

Philip Edmonds

by Guest 05.09.11 8:57

What I would like to know is, why did Philip Edmonds arrange to leave the resort, one day earlier than expected?

From Stephen Carpenter’s statement:

DCF: We arrived at about seven because we had the children with us and I saw a man sitting at the table next to us with three children.

SC: Yes
.
DCF: He was going to take a plane the next day to Switzerland, given that the children's mother lived there, I had never seen him before that night, but he ended up joining us for a coffee, he was a MW tourist.

by Guest 05.09.11 9:00

by happychick 05.09.11 9:04

Tony Bennett wrote:In the 1980s, Margaret Hodge did two things that made her famous (or infamous). She married Sir Henry Hodge (her second marriage), and became known as Margaret Hodge. And she became a prominent Labour Councillor in left-wing Islington, where she was later notorious for covering up extensive child abuse in what became known as the 'Islington Children's Home Scandal', fully exposed in the 1990s (there's a lot about this on the internet).

In 2003, despite this appalling record, Prime Minister Tony Blair made her Britain's first-ever 'Minister for Children' (!)

Would this account for the unprecedented high level of political support? Di10

Is this the same Margaret Hodge who was a close friend of Princess Diana?

So one of the women worked with children in a nursery and the other one covered up child abuse? How on earth did these two women, with opposite interests, become friends?

by Guest 05.09.11 9:05

Would this account for the unprecedented high level of political support? Reporton5th

If Mr Edmonds left the resort on the 4th, why did he not check out?

This is the report run on the 5th and his reservation is still there.

Perhaps he left in a rush and forget to check out?

by happychick 05.09.11 9:07

Maybe he took Madeleine's body to Switzerland?

by **tigger** 05.09.11 9:11

Stella wrote:It has been reported that the Oppenheimer family are the 3rd richest family in the UK and where there is big money, there is always politics.

Still, curioser and curioser, as Alice would say.

As I said in an earlier post, the whole set up is reminiscent of the assasination of Kennedy. James File, who was a hit man for the Mafia, and says (with good evidence incidentally) that everybody was there although nobody acknowledged each other. He saw various underworld figures, CIA handlers and so on. The three 'tramps' who weren't tramps, the Cuban liberation people, you name it. Even Nixon was in town! (this is also backed up with evidence).
Another similarity: nearly all the photographic evidence was 'doctored' especially the famous Zapruder film.

So in PdL we now have a whole slew of influential people. Some of whom, like the Hodge family now seem quite out of place there. Surely they could afford more luxurious holidays, where the climate in early May would be a lot better?
We now need the guest lists of at least the previous three years.

by Guest 05.09.11 9:11

Tony Bennett wrote:
Dear Mr Bennett,
I am in receipt of your letter of 22 July regarding Madeleine McCann. I am sure you would appreciate that it would not be appropriate for me to comment too much, as we do not know each other, and I have no idea what your connection to the case is. However, I would also not want further conspiracy theories to fester by simply ignoring your letter.
Therefore, I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, which showed her in the background) was passed both to the police and to the McCanns at the time. Having been in Portugal at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance and seen all of the events first hand, there is not one shred of doubt in my mind that the events as reported were correct.
In fact one of the most terrible parts of this tragedy is that there are people out there who are questioning this, just adding further to the nightmare that the McCann family have suffered. I cannot imagine anything crueller.
I’m afraid I won’t enter into further correspondence on this matter with you.
Yours sincerely,
Philip Edmonds

This is rather odd statement to make. Mr Edmonds boys were 6, 7 & 8 years of age at that time. They were not in the same creche group as Madeleine. Madeleine was never taken to the evening Tapas restaurant. At lunch time, the McCanns' claim to have eaten back at their apartment. So how did these children come to be in the same picture as Madeleine?

by **tigger** 05.09.11 9:29

Yes, he got out of town damn quick. Not, I think with the body, but what is going on here?
Probably didn't know what was to happen on the 3rd? Seems like panic to me.

The only wild thing I can think of here, is that Maddie died in early April and a month later everything and everybody was in place to act out the 'play'.
The thing is for me: if she died on 29/30th April, that was still not a lot of time to plan the whole thing. I really think the planning is key, apply Occam's razor and remove everything that need NOT have been in place and was accidental or plain stupidity on the part of the planners. (e.g. the shutters).
When we're left with everything that absolutely needed to be in place?
A number of powerful people in whose best interest it was to go along with the stupid plan of the McCs?

As you say, photo evidence seems useless. Perhaps it's a little girl in pink.

E.g. the film in the bus: to show they were all there, present and correct. (it only shows a girl in pink, nothing to prove it's Maddie). The pink theme is rather overdone I feel, as in the playground photos. Kate tends to shove it down our throats, pink blanket, pink cuddlecat, pink clothes, yet I think she was wearing the red t shirt when she died, hence the cadaver scent.

by Guest 05.09.11 9:33

Would this account for the unprecedented high level of political support? Tapas

This is the only night Mr Edmonds is booked into the tapas restaurant that week.

by Guest 05.09.11 9:35

happychick wrote:Maybe he took Madeleine's body to Switzerland?

No way. Remember what they found in Kate and Gerry's car hired some 21 days AFTER Madeleine disappeared?

I do not believe that Mr Edmonds had anything to do with Madeleine's death whatsoever.

As to whether or not he recieved a tip-off from someone, to get the hell out of there as soon as possible, remains to be seen.

by happychick 05.09.11 9:38

tigger wrote:yet I think she was wearing the red t shirt when she died, hence the cadaver scent.

So, the bed hadn't been slept in and it looks like she was wearing a red tshirt.

I wonder when she died then if she hadn't gone to bed sedated and woke up and had an accident. She wouldn't have gone to bed wearing a red tshirt when the McCanns held up the pink pyjama's that they say she was wearing when she was taken and described by Tanner.

by Guest 05.09.11 9:43

Stella wrote:

This is the only night Mr Edmonds is booked into the tapas restaurant that week.

What is also interesting about this booking, is why it say 2+2. Yes, he was a party of 4, but 3 of them were children, so it should have read 1+3, or even 4.

by **Tony Bennett** 05.09.11 10:10

Stella wrote:
Tony Bennett wrote:
Dear Mr Bennett,
I am in receipt of your letter of 22 July regarding Madeleine McCann. I am sure you would appreciate that it would not be appropriate for me to comment too much, as we do not know each other, and I have no idea what your connection to the case is. However, I would also not want further conspiracy theories to fester by simply ignoring your letter.
Therefore, I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, which showed her in the background) was passed both to the police and to the McCanns at the time. Having been in Portugal at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance and seen all of the events first hand, there is not one shred of doubt in my mind that the events as reported were correct.
In fact one of the most terrible parts of this tragedy is that there are people out there who are questioning this, just adding further to the nightmare that the McCann family have suffered. I cannot imagine anything crueller.
I’m afraid I won’t enter into further correspondence on this matter with you.
Yours sincerely,
Philip Edmonds
This is rather odd statement to make. Mr Edmonds boys were 6, 7 & 8 years of age at that time. They were not in the same creche group as Madeleine. Madeleine was never taken to the evening Tapas restaurant. At lunch time, the McCanns' claim to have eaten back at their apartment. So how did these children come to be in the same picture as Madeleine?

I have to say I am highly sceptical as to whether our Mr Philip Edmonds is telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about that photograph.

For a start, he is vague about it, doesn't tell us where or when it was taken.

Second, if this is proof that Madeleine was alive on Thursday 3 May, why on earth has that photo not been reproduced, along with an affidavit of evidence from Mr Edmonds saying: "Here is a photograph I took of my boys playing with Madeleine at ___am/pm on Thursday 3 May"?

I am not accusing Mr Edmonds of lying, but I do think he should clear this up.

He cannot imagine anything 'crueller' than questioning the McCanns' account of events, as has been done by the original detectives who investigated the case.n

Well, I can - and without having a vivid imagination

by greenwatch 05.09.11 12:10

Tony Bennett wrote:
Stella wrote:Thanks to the Portuguese Police and the release of the guest lists, we have now come to piece together, that one of the people socialising with Kate and Gerry McCann that week, is very closely related to the Right Honourable Margaret Hodge MBE, MP.

REST SNIPPED
I think it's important for this discussion that we now identify the person closely related to Margaret ('Lady') Hodge who was at Praia da Luz with the McCanns that week, for his name is publicly available in the files: Mr Philip Martin Edmonds. He is Margaret Hodge's nephew.

Mr Edwards has a fascinating family history. Born on 31 August 1962 according to his entry on Geni.Com, he married Reina Hazenberg and they have three boys, all of whom were out with Philip in Praia da Luz for the week the McCanns were there. But not his wife Reina, so it seems. We also know from the Portuguese Police files that he mysteriously jetted off to Switzerland, where he lives, early on Friday morning (4 May 2011), apparnetly cutting short his holiday just as news was surfacing that a child had been abducted from Praia da Luz.

Visit the website of Stemcor.com, the world's largest steel company, with a turnover measured in billions, and Philip Edmonds' name again comes up as one of their 11-strong Board of Directors.

How did Philip Edmonds get so far? A clue is apparent from the same Stemcor.com website: Philips' Uncle Ralph - Ralph Oppenheimer - is also on the Stemcor Board.

Indeed, Stemcor, as a brief internet search reveals, is an Oppenheimer family business.

All this has come about because Philip's father, Herbert Edmonds, made a wise choice in marrying into the Oppenheimer family.

Hannah Oppenheimer was the eldest of five children of Hans Oppenheimer and his wife Lisbeth Hollitscher, an Austrian Jewess. Hans was born in Stuttgart, Germany but fled to Alexandria in the mid-1930s as Hitler's anti-Semitic Nazi regime was stepping up its persecution of Jews, in the lead-up to World War II.

His first four children, including Hannah, and of course her sister Margaret Eve Hodge, nee Oppenheimer, were all born in Alexandria, Egypt, Hodge being born on 8 September 1944 in Alexandria, Hannah three years later in Orpington, Kent. Hannah still lives in Kent (see below).

In the 1980s, Margaret Hodge did two things that made her famous (or infamous). She married Sir Henry Hodge (her second marriage), and became known as Margaret Hodge. And she became a prominent Labour Councillor in left-wing Islington, where she was later notorious for covering up extensive child abuse in what became known as the 'Islington Children's Home Scandal', fully exposed in the 1990s (there's a lot about this on the internet).

In 2003, despite this appalling record, Prime Minister Tony Blair made her Britain's first-ever 'Minister for Children' (!)

Lady Hodge inherited a substantial slice of the Oppenheimer fortune, and is one of Britain's wealthiest women; despite that, she claimed excessive Parliamentary expenses from us, the British taxpayers (see reports on the MPs' expenses scandal).

Philip's father and mother, Herbert and Hannah Edmonds, aged 81 and 74 resepctively, live in Bromley, Kent. Philip is beleived to be based in Switzerland.

Hannah Oppenheimer's father Hans was the son of Salomon Oppenheimer, born 1871 in Ohringen, west Germany, and in turn Salomon is the son of Abraham Oppenheimer, who in turn was the son of another Abraham Oppenheimer, from one of the many branches of this powerful German-Hewish family.

Edmonds is not an English name, it's an anglicised version of the German 'Emsheimer'. Philip Edmonds' father, Herbert Emsheimer, was born in Karlsruhe, wast Germany, in 1930, and the family changed their name to Edmonds on arriving in England.

Why Philip Edmonds should choose Praia da Luz as his choice of holiday venue for the week 28 April to 5 May 2007 is not known. And there is no explanation as to why Edmonds and his three sons jetted away from Praia da Luz on the morning of Friday 4 May 2007, just as the British public were tuning in to the news and learning that a British girl had been mysteriously abducted.

I wrote to Mr Edmonds recently about some of these matters and received this courteous but brief reply:

Dear Mr Bennett,

I am in receipt of your letter of 22 July regarding Madeleine McCann. I am sure you would appreciate that it would not be appropriate for me to comment too much, as we do not know each other, and I have no idea what your connection to the case is. However, I would also not want further conspiracy theories to fester by simply ignoring your letter.

Therefore, I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, which showed her in the background) was passed both to the police and to the McCanns at the time. Having been in Portugal at the time of Madeleine’s disappearance and seen all of the events first hand, there is not one shred of doubt in my mind that the events as reported were correct.

In fact one of the most terrible parts of this tragedy is that there are people out there who are questioning this, just adding further to the nightmare that the McCann family have suffered. I cannot imagine anything crueller.

I’m afraid I won’t enter into further correspondence on this matter with you.

Yours sincerely,

Philip Edmonds

TONY BENNETT, I AM CERTAIN YOU ARE UNABLE TO READ/COMPREHEND WHAT YOU ARE READING. READ THE LETTER AGAIN.

QUOTE
I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, WHICH SHOWED HER IN THE BACKGROUND)
UNQUOTE

NOWHERE DOES IT STATE THAT PHILIP EDMOND'S CHILDREN WERE 'PLAYING WITH MADELEINE'.

WHY DO YOU NEED TO TWIST FACTS?

by Guest 05.09.11 12:20

As previously mentioned, the children were of different ages, so how could they have been in the same place at the same time?

by **Tony Bennett** 05.09.11 12:44

greenwatch wrote:TONY BENNETT, I AM CERTAIN YOU ARE UNABLE TO READ/COMPREHEND WHAT YOU ARE READING. READ THE LETTER AGAIN.

QUOTE

I can confirm that whatever information I had (including some photos of my sons taken on the day Madeleine disappeared, WHICH SHOWED HER IN THE BACKGROUND)

UNQUOTE

NOWHERE DOES IT STATE THAT PHILIP EDMONDS' CHILDREN WERE 'PLAYING WITH MADELEINE'.

WHY DO YOU NEED TO TWIST FACTS?

I concede you make a valid point, though far too aggressively. Please note that contributors here are polite to each other; please observe the usual courtesies on this forum or you will be banned.

Now, I wrote:

Second, if this is proof that Madeleine was alive on Thursday 3 May, why on earth has that photo not been reproduced, along with an affidavit of evidence from Mr Edmonds saying: "Here is a photograph I took of my boys playing with Madeleine at ___am/pm on Thursday 3 May"?

I agree that it would have been better and more accurate if I had written:

Second, if this is proof that Madeleine was alive on Thursday 3 May, why on earth has that photo not been reproduced, along with an affidavit of evidence from Mr Edmonds saying: "Here is a photograph I took of my boys with Madeleine in the background at ___am/pm on Thursday 3 May"?

That remains a question that both the McCanns and Philip Edmonds might like to answer.

by greenwatch 05.09.11 12:47

Stella wrote:As previously mentioned, the children were of different ages, so how could they have been in the same place at the same time?

DO YOU LIVE ON THE MOON, STELLA? WHY DON'T you ask Mark Warner why they allow residents and NON-residents to wander through the communal grounds which are very pleasant and attract people from other villas/apartments/hotels (A PRACTICE IN COMMON WITH ALL THE OTHER RESORTS)

Would this account for the unprecedented high level of political support? 6sz1wz