Thomas Harold Wise (born 13 May 1948) is a former Independent and UKIP Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the East of England. A former police officer, he was elected in 2004 as a member of the UK Independence Party but later had the whip withdrawn when allegations of misuse of parliamentary expenses surfaced in The Sunday Telegraph. Following an inquiry carried out by the European Anti-Fraud Office, Wise was formally charged with false accounting and money laundering by Bedfordshire Police. After initially pleading not guilty, he admitted the charges and was sentenced in November 2009 at Southwark Crown Court to a two-year term of imprisonment. He is thought to be the first MEP to be jailed for expenses fraud. Sentencing him, the judge said that Wise had engaged in "deliberate and blatant dishonesty" and had set about to defraud the European Parliament almost as soon as he was elected.
Early career
Born in Bournemouth, Wise attended Bournemouth School between 1959 and 1965, before completing a Diploma in Public Speaking in 1967. He served with Dorset Police before embarking on a career in the food distribution and processing industry. He became the UK managing director of a German herbs and spices company. From 1981 to 1989 he was a member of the Liberal Party.
Political career
UKIP
Wise joined the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) in 1997. He served as office manager to Jeffrey Titford MEP, during this period he worked on the rules governing MEPs' expenses and gained an expertise in the system which he would later use to his advantage. He was the fourth-placed candidate on UKIP's candidate list in for the European Parliament elections in 1999, and also stood as the party's candidate in the 1997, 2001 and 2005 general elections for the South West Bedfordshire constituency. In the 2005 general election, he came fourth with 4.2% of the votes cast.
He was elected as an MEP for UKIP in the 2004 European elections. He was UKIP's official spokesman on the Culture, Youth, Media and Sport Committee until his suspension by the party in February 2007. In his first speech to the Committee on 4 October 2004, Wise criticised the proposed budget and drew allusions with Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. In his maiden speech to the Parliament on 16 December 2004, Wise blamed the European Union for creating unacceptable conditions for the transit of animals around Europe. Wise also spoke out against the Proposed directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions
Independent
After losing the party whip in March 2007, Wise continued as an Independent within UKIP's Independence/Democracy parliamentary grouping pending the outcome of the fraud inquiry.
During his time as an MEP, Wise disputed the genuine nature of the September 11th attacks. and labelled Russia-based businessman Alisher Usmanov, who is a shareholder of Arsenal F.C. a "gangster and racketeer"
Following the decision to press criminal charges against him, Wise decided not to contest the 2009 European Parliament elections. He did however say that he wanted to stand as an MP in the 2010 General Election.
Fraud conviction
Exposure
On 23 October 2005, a reporter for the Sunday Telegraph, Daniel Foggo, published an article accusing Wise of claiming £36,000 a year from the European Parliament in the name of his researcher, Lindsay Jenkins, while only passing on about a sixth of that amount to her. According to now-repealed rules governing the payment of expenses and allowances to Members of the European Parliament, MEPs could claim up to £125,000 per year for assistants' wages, but this money must be paid either directly to the employees or to a third-party agent. The rules did not allow the funds to pass directly through the hands of MEPs themselves.