A real, actual political scandal is going on in the UK:

ibtimes.co.uk

The “cash-for-questions” lobbying scandal has spread to the House of Lords only days after ending the career of Tory MP Patrick Mercer.

Investigations by two national newspapers and the BBC have led to more damaging revelations of a lobbying racket operating in parliament.

Lord Cunningham, Lord Laird and Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate are accused of taking money to ask parliamentary questions, lobby ministers and host events on the House of Lords terrace.

…

Cunningham, a privy counsellor who led the committee on Lords reform under Tony Blair, asked for 144,000 a year to provide a personal lobbying service.

Laird and Mackenzie revealed peers were colluding to conceal their conflicts of interest from the public through a secret job-swapping scam in which they pooled their clients to pull strings on each other’s behalf.

The peers offered to act as paid advocates for a firm pressing for new laws to benefit its business. They also promised to set up an all-party parliamentary group as a lobbying vehicle.

Cunningham was caught in a newspaper sting in which reporters posed as lobbyists for a fictitious South Korean solar energy company.

“Are you suggesting 10,000 a month?” he told the Sunday Times decoy. “Make that 12,000 a month. I think we could do a deal on that.”