The Electoral Commission is to contact Barnes & Richmond Labour Club about its large donation to the Labour Party

Following Martin Williams’ report on analysis by openDemocracy, which shows that the Carlton Club has been channelling money to the Conservative Party and its MPs since the last election, Adam Ramsay (Open Democracy) reports that the UK’s election watchdog is probing a major donor to the Labour Party over an apparent breach of transparency laws. The central party did not respond to openDemocracy’s request for comment.

Barnes & Richmond Labour Club and Institute donated £598,000 to Labour in December 2022. The organisation is listed by the central party as an unincorporated association, a legal term for organisations that aren’t registered companies or other formal bodies. It doesn’t, however, appear in the register of unincorporated associations despite having donated more than half a million pounds to Labour. A spokesperson for the club said the central Labour Party hadn’t informed them of this rule.

The club has not yet accounted for the source of these funds, although its former secretary told openDemocracy the cash had come from the 2018 sale of the four-storey townhouse club building (above).

An Electoral Commission spokesperson told Open Democracy, “We are contacting the club to find out more information about this matter and their status and we will then consider what, if any, action is appropriate.”

Rose Whiffen of Transparency International said: “Unincorporated associations can be useful vehicles for local fundraising clubs to rally support for a political party in their area, but ambiguous and weak reporting requirements mean their financial arrangements are often kept from public view.

“Very few of these groups actually report the original source of their donations, making it far too easy for money of dubious origin to fund political parties. Clearly, [donors] should abide by the current rules, but to bring dark money out of the shadows, we need a significantly lower threshold for transparency over these donations”.

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A call for Parliament to close a device enabling foreign donors to influence Conservative MPs

Martin Williams reports that analysis by openDemocracy shows that the Carlton Club has been channelling money to the Conservative Party and its MPs since the last election. His detailed article may be read in full here.

The Carlton Club, a private members’ club in St James’s, London, was the original home of the Conservative Party before the creation of Conservative Central Office.

It has received funding from two companies run by wealthy Swiss, German and Russian nationals who are not UK citizens.

Under election law, only UK citizens are allowed to make political donations, but loopholes allow their money to be passed via third parties such as these.

It is two years since an independent government advisory group, the Committee on Standards in Public Life, urged then-PM Boris Johnson to close the loophole – something neither he nor his successors have done.

The Carlton Club (above) and its political committee have given thousands of pounds to Conservative Party candidates. Williams notes that donations have been made to Lee Anderson, the deputy chair of the party, and former defence minister Sarah Atherton.

The Carlton Club is an “unincorporated association”, a type of organisation that is not required to file accounts with Companies House. The Committee on Standards in Public Life, which was set up in 1994, has said that these groups could be used as “a route for foreign money to influence UK elections”.

Its 2021 report ‘Regulating Election Finance’ said – surprisingly – that “no transparency” is required when these groups donate to individual MPs and the people funding them “are not required to be permissible donors”.

The committee then presented the government with 47 recommendations to reform election finance, including a clampdown on unincorporated associations. But two years later, none of the reforms have been implemented.

Solicitor George Havenhand, a senior legal researcher at Spotlight on Corruption, told openDemocracy: “It’s time for a serious discussion led by the Electoral Commission about prohibiting donations from unincorporated associations altogether, to tackle this major loophole in party political finance.”

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Discovered by chance: Ian Hislop’s contribution to the parliamentary select committee on standards in January

Highly recommended for content – or – for the politically uninterested, for its theatrical impact: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3O8mwDFo4M

The writer cancelled a Private Eye sub years ago, feeling that it was no longer ‘ahead’ of the news, and stopped watching HIGNFY because it had become unpleasantly sneering and self-satisfied,

However Ian Hislop’s valuable contribution to the parliamentary select committee on standards in January was extremely powerful and effective as were the interventions of his colleagues Solomon Hughes and Richard Brooks.

It will appeal to those on the original mailing list of this website which was set up thirteen years ago to raise awareness of the ‘revolving door’, rewards for failure, widespread behind-the-scene lobbying and party funding which corrupt the decision-making process here and abroad. This meant that the social, economic and environmental challenges facing this country are not being effectively addressed, due to the distortion of policy-making by those on ‘an inside track, who wield privileged access and disproportionate influence’ according to a 2009 report by the Parliamentary Public Administration Select Committee [PASC].

The Youtube blurb says : “ Proceedings became combative and at times cringeworthy as the journalists began reading out the MPs’ own registers of interest as examples of the lack of transparency in British politics. Tories Sir Bernard Jenkin and Alberto Costa both seemed quite distressed”.

One useful statement made by Ian Hislop was that MPs should put decisions to accept money, gifts and apponitments to their constituents during their election campaign .

Two of the viewers’ comments:

Christopher Stevens:

What an absolutely atrocious system. Firstly, elected MPs and officials on the committee are asking non-elected bodies (journalists) on how the Government should uphold the Nolan Principles. Secondly, as Hislop says, why are MPs confused about the rules?

The answer is seen towards the end of the clip where an MP, asked about gifts becomes increasingly uncomfortable and the chair shuts down the question and points raised. That is the problem. This is just a token gesture and a process which government adopts time and time again, where serious questions are kicked into the long grass and discussed ad nauseam until the public and the very issues raised have been long forgotten.

The simple truth is that the relationship between MPs & Lords and that of big business and the lobbying industry is now too close and the waters muddied. There can be no reason why an MP paid over £82,000pa plus generous expenses has any employment outside the house for his/her term as an MP.

This nonsense about MPs elected for their knowledge in industry or other areas is a weak argument. After leaving the house, MPs should not be allowed to take up positions which they are actively headhunted to provide services to that industry because of what they know about “process”.

The process is simple: The investigations and policing of the system are deliberately weak. MPs and Lords are quite happy to accept jobs outside of the MP role because this is insurance if they are to be booted out of office after an election. The declaration system is full of holes as there is no real way of telling what these declarations mean for the general voter, even if they bother to look at the register of interests.

The system is then topped by a bunch of MPs & lay people who, judging by this lot, have absolutely no interest in changing the system or are so innately thick they have to ask journalists who have a sketchy view on ethics from previous cases brought nor do they wish to ask embarrassing questions to avoid the reputation of the Right Honourables being tarnished.

Fizz Disco

Well done to Ian, Richard and Solomon for not letting this group steer the agenda away from the basic fact that there needs to be more control with real power and teeth when it comes to lobbying.

Again and again, Ian asked ‘why do you think these companies are paying out this money?”…….. did none of the MP’s think that a open recording of their meeting would be shelved and not seen publicly for people to make a judgement. He ended:

“No one who sees this recording can be in any doubt that parliament doesn’t have a grip on lobbying and dodgy payments to MP’s . . . is there a deliberate attempt here to keep things the way they are rather than act on Ian’s evidence?”

 

 

 

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Secret State 29: Why doesn’t the MoD tell the whole truth about our military operations in Iraq?

As British forces aid death and destruction in several countries, the BBC and many other mainstream media outlets remain silent but report at length on trivia like the divorce of an American show business personality  

The MoD website states that Britain is not taking part in combat operations in Iraq: “British troops are not in a combat role in Iraq but are on the ground with coalition partners providing training and equipment to Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and Kurdish Security Forces (KSF)”.

It fails to add that the Royal Air Force takes part in Operation Inherent Resolve – US-led coalition ‘combat operations’ – launching air strikes over Iraq and Syria  

 An airstrike on Mosul in Iraq

From the start of the operation in September 2014 to January 2019, the Ministry of Defence claimed that 1,700 British airstrikes had killed or injured 3,229 in Iraq.

Though figures from the Ministry of Defence (MOD) show that only one civilian has been killed by RAF airstrikes as part of the mission against IS, the US said at least 1,257 civilians had died as a result of 33,921 US-led coalition airstrikes between August 2014 and January 2019.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) also revealed – in response to an FoI request from Drone Wars UK –  that British Reaper drones are undertaking missions outside Operation Shader  the UK’s military operation against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. The operation has cost £1.75 billion. The MoD has refused to say how many ‘non-Shader’ sorties there have been.

Forces Net video confirms that Iraq is the focus of the UK and other coalition nations targeting IS

Forces Net, which brings the latest news on the UK Armed Forces and the wider military world, features a video in which Air Commodore Justin Reuter (below left) confirmed that Iraq is the focus of the UK and other coalition nations targeting IS, otherwise known as Daesh. He said: “The last few targets we’ve struck have all been in Iraq, they’ve all been in support of Iraqi security forces, clearing Daesh areas, areas where they have insurgents.”

After a U.S. drone strike killed a senior Iraqi security official and an Iranian commander, the Iraqi Parliament passed a resolution demanding the government expel American forces from Iraq, though it has not yet been implemented.

An evacuation plan has been devised as fears of reprisal attacks on the US and its allies grow

A leaked draft letter written by Brigadier-General William Seely, head of the Military’s Task Force Iraq, said it would be “repositioning” troops to prepare for “movement out” of the country.

On 7th January, Forces Net reported that the United Kingdom sent a team to Iraq to help the British military contingency to plan for every eventuality, including if there is a need for soldiers, diplomats and other civilians to evacuate the country.

Days after a senior Iraqi security official was killed in a drone strike, the Iranian government launched missile attacks against U.S. forces at the Ain al Assad air base in Iraq’s Anbar Province, wounding more than 100 troops.

             US military personnel inspecting the damaged air-base

On 15th February the New York Times reported a rocket attack on the airport in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil on Monday which killed a civilian contractor with the American-led military coalition and wounded six others, including a U.S. service member, according to a coalition spokesman. Several other rockets landed in residential areas of the city, the capital of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, including one close to the Chinese Consulate.

The MoD website confirms that the British Army has a military presence in 80 countries and recent research findings say that British troops are stationed in 145 overseas military bases located across 42 countries, but Covid-19 has been an important reminder that international relations, the health, wealth and prosperity of countries across the globe are intrinsically linked.

As MPs such as Richard Burgon and organisations including NATO Watch are stressing, Britain should reassess its priorities and focus on measures that tackle the real threats faced by our society – the climate crisis, global poverty and the Covid-19 pandemic — and end the military spending spree.

 

 

 

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Media 113: a legal breakthrough – poisoned pilot compensated

Len Lawrence, a former BAE pilot whose health was seriously damaged by toxic fumes on board the aircraft he worked on, draws attention to a legal breakthrough in the States.

In 2017 the weekly update issued by JetBlue Master Executive Council, which implements the policies and procedures of the Air Line Pilots Association International, reported that one of Jet Blue’s pilots, from Redmond, Oregon,  had been exposed to dangerous cockpit fumes (full details here).

“In January, Captain Andrew “Kirk” Myers was exposed to fumes while performing an engine run up at the request of maintenance. As a result of the fumes event, Kirk has had numerous health problems, been out on medical leave for months, and may never return to the flight deck”.

His employer, JetBlue Airways, a Long Island-based commercial airline, had stopped paying benefits to Myers, who’s been unable to fly since the 2017 incident.

Administrative law judge Darren Otto rules for this pilot injured by toxic fumes

Five days ago it was reported that the compensation claim made by Andrew Myers, subjected to toxic fumes in the cockpit, had prevailed in a hearing before law judge Darren Otto in the Oregon Workers Compensation Board Administrative court.

It’s the first case in the U.S. to establish that the fumes that injured Myers are dangerous, though Myers is far from alone in his injuries, his lawyer told The Bulletin.

The legal document: a snapshot

This was taken from a link to the website of the Aerotoxic Syndrome Team, which is dedicated to the education of flight crews and other people interested in the cause of fume contamination inside aircraft, the medical hazards of such inhalation and crews’ recognition and response. It aims to help those who have been injured.

In future will this country’s compensation-averse courts give a better hearing to British pilots and cabin crew whose health has been affected by fumes and the farmworkers who have inhaled similar pesticides?

 

 

 

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Secret State 27: MoD denies MPs access to report

Yesterday the Ministry of Defence refused to release a report to MPs on a £450m 2012 deal that saw four naval support tankers built in South Korea. 

This decision follows recent concern that – despite Brexit – British Ministers were saying that EU procurement rules mean the contract for building three Fleet Solid Support Ships, (FSS) has to be offered internationally.

Tobias Ellwood, the committee chairman, has said that the report “assesses the economic impact on the UK of handing a contract to a foreign firm, including the loss of UK shipbuilding jobs that are critical to national security”.

MPs in the Commons defence select committee wanted to see the report to understand how awarding such contracts in the UK could contribute to the national economy.

Last November, decision postponed to avoid loss of votes in affected areas

Earlier, Japan, Korea, Italy, Spain and a British consortium were competing for a contract to build the three ships, but in November the Ministry of Defence postponed the bidding in the final hours before Parliament dissolved

One independent defence analyst, Howard Wheeldon (right) asks readers to imagine knocking on doors in Birkenhead after taking a decision which would put so many out of work

Jeremy Quin, defence procurement minister, said that releasing the report would lead to the disclosure of commercially sensitive information, but Peter Sandeman, director of campaign group Save the Royal Navy, thought it “odd” the committee was not being allowed to see the report. He said: “Select committee MPs regularly see information that has operational security considerations”.

“The bottom line is the MoD is concerned it’s not going to get any more money,” according to Lord West, former head of the Navy.

John Spellar, deputy chairman of the committee, described that decision as “utterly absurd”. He said the report is “only being withheld to cover embarrassment as they realise the case for going abroad is in tatters. The country is facing the greatest unemployment since the Thirties. Awarding the FSS ships abroad would only add to the overall cost if it means thousands of shipbuilding and supply chain jobs going, meaning the country will end up paying for the ships twice with people on dole.”

The Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions building say that the FSS would protect 20,000 UK shipbuilding jobs and more in the supply chain, providing work in regional economies.

Lord West (left) adds that choosing the cheapest possible option would mean UK Plc losing out, with shipyards closing, the country missing out on the taxes that UK companies and employees would have paid and with increased unemployment.

Unions argue that while the initial cost of buying domestically might be higher, the trickle-down benefits would more than compensate. An analysis by the GMB suggests that, when the supply chain is factored in, building the FSS ships in the UK could support up to 16,000 jobs in the UK.

As forthright commentator Howard Wheeldon says, we are entering the age of a post-Brexit, independent Britain. That should mean freedom to undertake a total audit of financial, economic, social and environmental factors, in order to make a decision in the best interests of the country.

 

 

 

 

Secret State 26: Monbiot, “Why isn’t this scandal all over the front pages?”

Transparency International republished a Devex article (7th July) which opens: “Substandard ventilators, grossly overpriced equipment, lucrative contracts awarded to companies with little or no expertise — these are just a few of the disturbingly commonplace things we have seen during the COVID-19 pandemic in countries ranging from the U.K. and U.S. to Brazil and Slovenia”. Monbiot’s latest article, summarised here, focusses on the issue of transparent, competitive tendering, “a crucial defence against cronyism and corruption, essential to integrity in public life and public trust in politics”. He points out that, during the pandemic, the government has awarded contracts worth billions of pounds for equipment on which lives depend, without competition or transparency. One contract to test the effectiveness of the government’s coronavirus messaging worth £840,000 was awarded without competitive tendering. It was issued by the Cabinet Office, run by Michael Gove, to a company called Public First, owned by James Frayne and Rachel Wolf who worked with Michael Gove when he was education minister and with other Conservative government ministers and advisers for many years. There is a precedent: in 2010, Gove’s department awarded Wolf a £500,000 contract to promote “free schools” which also did not go to competitive tender. Though the government had six weeks to prepare for the pandemic, before the deal was done it claimed that it had to override the usual rules for public procurement because it was responding to an emergency. Monbiot debunks this defence and outlines two other problems with this contract. The FT reported that around 16,000 potential suppliers contacted a 500-person buying team set up by the Cabinet Office in March to offer to supply kit for hospital staff. Monbiot points out that some had a long track record in manufacturing or supplying PPE and had stocks that could be deployed immediately. Government decided, however, to award PestFix – a pest control company with no manufacturing experience – a £32 million contract to supply surgical gowns, again relying on the emergency defence to justify its decision. To date Pestfix has procured only half of the desperately needed gowns from a Chinese supplier. Monbiot says, “I think we may reasonably ask what the hell is going on”. The Good Law Project is doing just that. It is crowdfunding a challenge in the High Court against Michael Gove, issuing proceedings alleging breaches of procurement law and apparent bias in the grant of these contracts to his long-standing associates.       .

 

 

 

 

 

Dr Li Wenliang has counterparts in Britain – and millions all over the world

Most readers will have heard of Dr Li Wenliang who worked at a hospital in Wuhan and alerted the authorities to this infectious new form of the coronavirus and was reprimanded by Chinese police last month for spreading “illegal and false” information about a new form of coronavirus. He later died after contracting the coronavirus from a patient.

But whereas exposure to this zoonotic disease was unforeseen, worldwide people are being affected, before birth and during their lives, by legally permitted substances used in many sectors, including agriculture, industry and transport. In Britain, whistle-blowers – medical practitioners and patients – are also silenced by medical, legal and political authorities. Is this done in order to protect a range of wealthy and powerful companies?

Richard Bruce, Len Lawrence and George Wescott are among millions worldwide who have attempted to raise the alarm after suffering serious damage to health from exposure to chemicals in these sectors.

Message received yesterday; “WE ARE THE DR LI WENLIANG[s] of UK”

Len Lawrence was a fit, experienced pilot who had been working for British Aerospace since 1989 when he experienced and recorded his first ‘fume event’  Read and hear more about the drastic steps taken to silence him here. The BBC reports that five of the UK’s largest airlines are now facing legal action by four pilots, and 47 cabin crew members. It is claimed that pilots and cabin crew are still regularly exposed to toxic fumes during flights. The Unite union has Independent expert evidence that the fumes from the oil used to lubricate the jet engines, contain organophosphates and TCP, and that long-term exposure can damage the nervous system and may lead to chronic irreversible health problems in susceptible individuals.

Such people, often sidelined and mislabelled as having psychological problems, will take heart from the Telegraph’s report that, in December, an official report confirmed that British Airways pilots were forced to wear oxygen masks as a plane suffered five “fume events” in seven weeks.

George Wescott suffered severe health problems after dipping 1,500 sheep in July 1988 with an organophosphate dip, a compulsory process ordered by government. By August 1991 he realised he would never recover sufficiently to continue farming, relinquished tenancy of the farm and set up a National Action Group to make sure fellow farmers were aware of the dangers. His interview during a protest outside the Royal Courts of Justice may be heard on video here. In a 2015 parliamentary debate, his MP said that George (right) had suffered for more than 30 years and recommended the Minister to set up a commission to get to the bottom of the issue.

In June 1992 MAFF abandoned its policy of compulsory dipping

Richard Bruce, a farm manager whose health broke down after exposure to Actellic used in grain stores, says very few realise that farmers and grain store operators have for decades been pouring OPs and other poisons (in pesticides and fungicides) into harvested grains and oilseeds. He now has an extensive knowledge on the effects of organophosphates which are used far more widely in agriculture than just sheep dip – see his comprehensive collection of information at The Organophosphate File. Like Len & George, he has met a range of obstacles and unfair dealing whilst attempting to get official recognition of the dangers of using chemicals such as malathion, pirimiphos methyl, chlorpyrifos methyl, some of which were approved long after the dangers were known. 

His verdict: there are none so blind as those who are paid not to see:

“Professionally Induced Nelson’s Eye Syndrome…. They see no evidence – no matter how much there is or even if they published it themselves. All I seek is for the truth to be recognised by those who are trying to hide it in order for the public to understand what has been done to everyone”. He asks:

“Why is it that individuals are prosecuted for deliberately poisoning people but companies who make products that injure and kill thousands worldwide every year, escape blame? Makes no sense at all”.

 

 

 

 

Media 97: An inconvenient truth? A Dutch reader notes UK’s ZERO coverage of 40,000 climate change demo in Amsterdam

She writes: “*zero* coverage in the UK over climate demo Sunday 10th in Amsterdam?! 40,000 people at climate change demo in Amsterdam and it RAINED heavily all day … we got soaked to our underwear …)!!”

An online search today saw no UK coverage on the first four ‘result’ pages – only American and European coverage.

Adding wryly: “When 40 yellow vests get together it’s shared all over the planet…

Forty thousand people joined a climate change protest in Amsterdam on Sunday, March 10th, urging the Dutch government to take action on climate change.

The demonstration, the first of its kind in the Netherlands, drew around 40,000 people despite heavy rain, according to Agence France-Presse.

“The high turnout is the proof that people now want a decisive policy on climate from the government,” Greenpeace, one of the march organizers, said in a statement.

The Netherlands could be especially vulnerable to the rising tides brought on by climate change. Much of the country already sits below sea level, and some of its land is sinking.

While the U.S. has been backpedalling out of global climate change agreements like the Paris accord, Dutch lawmakers have passed ambitious climate change laws, seeking a 95% reduction of the 1990 emissions levels by 2050.

In January, however, a Dutch environmental research agency said the government is lagging behind its goals. “We are under sea level, so we really need to do something about it,” said a 21-year-old climate studies student at Amsterdam University.

Students around the world have been leading protests to prompt their governments to address climate change. A worldwide school strike is planned for later this week. Greta Thunberg, a Swedish teenager widely known for her climate change activism, said on Twitter that at least 82 countries plan to participate in the upcoming protest.

Will British media fail to report the forthcoming school strikes as well as this one?

 

 

 

 

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Deliberately down-played? Belatedly, MSM publishes limited accounts of a government-funded thinktank’s dubious activities

On the 2^nd December the Daily Record revealed that Gateshead Mills in Fife, which ‘presents’ as a small ‘design and creativity charity’ operating from an old Victorian mill in Fife, has been revealed in leaked documents passed to the Sunday Mail – the sister paper of the Daily Record – as the base for The Institute for Statecraft, whose Integrity Initiative is run by military intelligence specialists and receives £2million from the Foreign Office.

Spokesman Stephen Dalziel said: “It (the IFS) was set up 14 years ago and the Integrity Initiative programme was started three years ago to look at disinformation and malign influence on democratic societies and it just so happens it’s the Russians who are doing most of that at the moment . . .  What we have done is to set up this network across Europe of people who understand what the problem is”.

The Integrity Initiative claims to have built a network of networks of people who operate to counter Russia’s ‘disinformation’. The UK cluster has staff from the Institute for Statecraft, people representing hedge fund interests, think tanks like DEMOS, RUSI, Henry Jackson Society, European Council on Foreign Relations, and Chatham House, as well as from the Ministry of Defence (including EU Joint Headquarters at Northwood), the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and several journalists.

The link to the Daily Record article is no longer accessible but one dated a week later – and far less revealing – may be read here. Another article, first seen in NY Herald Tribune, reproduced with permission from the UK Column, presents a fully illustrated and even more revealing  information and – to date – its link works.  

Back to the currently inaccessible Daily Record. The leaks detail Government grant applications and the Foreign Office has now confirmed that they provided substantial funding to the Integrity Initiative. In response to a parliamentary question, Europe Minister Alan Duncan said: “In financial year 2017-18, the FCO funded the Institute for Statecraft’s Integrity Initiative £296,500. This financial year, the FCO are funding a further £1,961,000. Both have been funded through grant agreements.” A Foreign & Commonwealth Office spokesperson said: “The Integrity Initiative is a programme already in the public domain. Our funding helps ensure it can continue producing important work to counter disinformation and other malign influence.”

The investigation has found evidence that the programme’s official Twitter account has been used to attack Corbyn, his strategy and communications director Seumas Milne, the Labour Party and its officials.

Further leaked documents appear to indicate that the Integrity Initiative’s “Spanish cluster” swung into action on hearing that Pedro Banos was to be appointed director of the national security department. The papers detail how the Integrity Initiative alerted “key influencers” around Europe who launched an online campaign against the politician.

The manager of the Integrity Initiative ‘appears to be’ Christopher Donnelly.

A website biography states that he is a reserve officer in the British Army Intelligence Corps who previously headed the British Army’s Soviet Studies Research Centre at Sandhurst. Between 1989 and 2003, he was a special adviser to NATO Secretaries General and was involved in dealing with the disintegration of the Soviet Union and reform of newly emerging democracies in Central and Eastern Europe. He left NATO in 2003 to set up and run the UK Defence Academy’s Advanced Research and Assessment Group. In 2010, he became a director of IFS.

UK column adds many other staff names, including that of the active Andy Pryce.

Pryce had been making statements to the press about Russia (well worth reading in the light of this article), where he was described as ‘Head of Counter Disinformation and Media Development’ at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in September 2017. He is said to have taken part in:

• an event called ‘DEMOCRACY AND PROPAGANDA: Can independent media defend universal values?’, said to have been held in the Hilton Hotel in London, though the link advertises a Ukrainian location.. This was organised jointly by the European Endowment for Democracy and the EU Eastern Partnership, which, it turns out, is an FCO programme(link now not working) that “works to counter and reduce the effect of destabilising disinformation”.
• the first round of Ukrainian-British interagency consultationson countering cyber threats held in London in March this year,
• the 2018 EU DisinfoLab, in April and
• in October he took part in the Atlantic Council’s Global Forum on Strategic Communications and Digital Disinformationevent, held in Washington DC. Of note here is that this was a two-day event. Andy Pryce’s contribution came on day two, which has not been made available on video.

UK column journalist Mike Robinson made a FOI request for more information but this was refused on the basis of ‘national security’ – though he noted that the Freedom of Information act says that national security can only be used as grounds for refusal where intelligence services are involved. The FCO’s response is now under investigation by the Information Commissioner.

Some will want to read more about the Integrity Initiative, which appears to be acting in the way that western governments and media claim Russia is doing.

The UK Column adds other staff names, including:

• Ben Bradshaw MP, who has been promoting an anti-Russian outlook, including claiming that Russia “interfered” with the Brexit referendum,
• Sir Andrew Wood, former British ambassador to Russia, and one of the founders of Orbis Business Intelligence, the privatised British intelligence operation which features Christopher Steele, the author of the Trump ‘dodgy dossier’ and
• Oliver McTernan, a former Senior Adviser at the Club of Madrid and a Visiting Fellow, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University. In 2002, he initiated and participated in the first official high-level post conflict talks between NATO and the government in Belgrade. For 25 years he was Executive Committee Member, Pax Christi International, responsible for the movement’s East-West Dialogue programme during the Soviet period. He is the founder and a director of the St Sergius Trust Fund based in London and Moscow, and was earlier a Roman Catholic priest based in the diocese of Westminster.

David Miller, noted professor of Political Sociology in the School for Policy Studies at the University of Bristol, says that serious questions need to be answered:  

“It seems extraordinary that the Foreign Office would be funding a Scottish charity to counter Russian propaganda which, for example, ends up soft-pedalling far-right politicians in the Ukraine because they happen to oppose Putin. It must raise questions with OSCR, the Scottish charity regulator, about breaching charitable rules. It would appear this organisation could have received almost £2million from the FCO, so people have a right to know what’s happening with their money.”

Labour MSP Neil Findlay added: “It would appear that we have a charity registered in Scotland and overseen by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator that is funded by the UK Government and is spewing out political attacks on UK politicians, the Labour Party and the Labour movement. Such clear political attacks and propaganda shouldn’t be coming from any charity. We need to know why the Foreign Office have been funding it.”

 

 

 

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