Bell Yard Press Coverage

Whipping up the sympathy vote THE WAY WE LIVE NOW

By MAGGIE URRY
14 July 2006

While the public relations campaign behind the NatWest Three cannot really be called a success, since they got on the aircraft yesterday morning and have now spent their first night in custody in the US, their case has certainly achieved a higher and more uncomfortable profile for the government than Tony Blair would have hoped.

Leading lights behind the campaign have been Melanie Riley of Bell Yard, who was first employed by the three in August 2004, joined in more recent months by Adrian Flook of M Communications. With money getting tight, even for bankers, both Riley and Flook have been providing their services on a pro bono basis.

Flook's advantage is that having spent four years as Conservative MP for Taunton he knows just how to work up political fury and make use of parliamentary rules. It is quite something to have helped generate the defeat of the government in the House of Lords, which in turn must have influenced the Speaker's decision to permit an emergency debate in the House of Commons.

Both believe that the main achievement of the campaign has been to highlight their side's view of the inequality of the extradition arrangements. But perhaps even more of an achievement is that the public perception of the three has been turned from that of apparently wealthy bankers, alleged to have been involved in an Pounds 11m fraud and attempting to escape justice, to deeply wronged men being ripped from the bosoms of their families, destined for servitude in a vile penitentiary.

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