Rishi Sunak and the Conservative Party.

[dosxuk]

Cummings helped without a doubt, and of course in the last election Brexit (and specifically 'getting it done') was a much bigger issue than it will be next time. And the mess that the opposition had got themselves into certainly helped Boris too.

But, I get the impression that Boris was, and still is personally popular. And if he can write a narrative presenting himself as the saviour of the UK (fix the NHS without saying how, deal with the energy crisis, and standing up to Putin), I can see a scenario where voters decide to give him another chance. I think Boris could hold some of the Red Wall seats - whereas Sunak has no chance.

A bigger problem for Boris returning is that he made an enemy of Cummings - and Cummings seemed to be taking great delight in all the leaks about Boris's behaviour in the lead up to his ousting. I fully expect that if Boris was to make another serious attempt at the leadership, those leaks would all start flowing again and he'd find himself having to hide in a fridge again.

 

[najaB]

Time to stop the Brexit denialism I think.

Especially the brand of Brexit denialism that holds that what we've got is the best possible outcome. The problem hasn't been Brexit (though the concept itself was flawed) but the particular type of Brexit that we have ended up with.

Had we tried to achieve something EFTA-esque (assuming that true EFTA membership was off the table) then we would be in a lot better position than we are now.

 

[Typhoon]

No improvements is the current Tory message. Things like "my staff can live on less than £30k and not need a food bank" - ignoring that said person is renting a room and so there's likely to be little hope of aspiring to buy their own place; as about 40% of their take home is being spent on rent (£29,500 is pretty much spot on 40%).

Is the biggest thing that our next generation of graduates can aspire to is that they don't use a food bank?

Also said person attended a private school as a paying pupil. and there is almost certainly a 'Bank of Mum and Dad'.

She is almost certainly working for an MP so she can get some experience before moving on to a higher paid job elsewhere, it is a well-trodden path. I expect she regrets her choice of employer, though.

Lee Anderson has the seventh-highest staff turnover in parliament, a New Statesman investigation has revealed.

Quote from https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/p...highest-staff-turnovers-in-parliament-342204/. New Statesman article behind a paywall.

The parliamentary researcher who was caught in the eye of a social media storm today after a Tory MP tweeted out her salary details is an alumna of an £33,000-a-year private school whose father served with distinction in the Armed forces.

Blunt-talking backbencher Lee Anderson MP was left facing a House of Commons probe after he shared an image of Katy Colthup, one of his parliamentary staffers, on his Twitter feed today and championed the fact she didn't need to use a food bank despite earning less than £30,000 a year.

Ms Colthup, who read politics at the University of Nottingham, previously attended the fee-paying St Peter's School in York, where tuition starts at £11,310 per term for boarding pupils.

Her father, Brigadier David Colthup CBE, was a decorated senior leader within the British Army whose 34 years of service included combat operations in Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Afghanistan.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...aide-attended-33-000-year-private-school.html

 

[brad465]

Sunak has ordered an investigation/ethics probe into Zahawi:

Rishi Sunak orders investigation into Nadhim Zahawi tax row

Rishi Sunak says there are "questions that need answering" over the Conservative party chairman's tax affairs.

www.bbc.co.uk

Rishi Sunak says there are "questions that need answering" over Nadhim Zahawi tax case and PM's independent ethics adviser will investigate

 

[najaB]

Sunak has ordered an investigation/ethics probe into :

Rishi Sunak orders investigation into Nadhim Zahawi tax row

Rishi Sunak says there are "questions that need answering" over the Conservative party chairman's tax affairs.

www.bbc.co.uk

And will Zahawi temporarily stand-aside as party chairman? No, of course not.

 

[edwin_m]

Indeed; I'm not saying Brexit is the number one cause of our problems (number three I think, with Covid fallout the first). But - what I find strange is how few Conservative MPs, members, or supporters, are openly critical about Brexit. I think I said this the other day, but surely there must be people who believe in low-tax low-spend (I don't, for avoidance of doubt) but also think Brexit was a stupid idea? There must surely be differences of opinion within the Tory Party, its members and supporters?

That's what I mean by "Brexit denialism". Within the Tory party it seems to be impossible to suggest that it's anything other than perfect. From the political point of view that's understandable to try to keep things together in the short term, but the rest of the population is increasingly seeing that the emperor has no clothes.

The Office for Budget Responsibility considers that the long-term economic impact of Brexit is significantly more than that of Covid.

I was a strong Remainer, but I never denied that Brexit would bring opportunities and benefits. I just thought the benefits and opportunities as part of the EU were greater.

But, I wonder why I am not hearing Brexit supporters highlighting the benefits it's brought? The best they seem to come up with is blue passports, crowns on pint glasses and more recently no foil on Champaign bottles. Meanwhile Remainers can point to increased friction in trade with the EU and our labour shortage affecting many sectors including our beloved NHS.

I don't recall any genuine tangible benefit ever being put forward on the Brexit thread. Some will no doubt say that the reduction of immigration was a benefit, but the labour shortages and their consequences are the flipside of this.

 

[ainsworth74]

Just a reminder that general Brexit chat that is not directly related to the Tory parties current scandals should be in the main Brexit thread which you can find here. We don't need two threads discussing the wider aspects of Brexit and the glorious success/utter disaster (delete as appropriate) it has been. It's such a totemic Tory party policy that there will clearly be overlap but if we could try and keep the main discussion of Brexit in one place that would be appriciated

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Indeed; I'm not saying Brexit is the number one cause of our problems (number three I think, with Covid fallout the first). But - what I find strange is how few Conservative MPs, members, or supporters, are openly critical about Brexit. I think I said this the other day, but surely there must be people who believe in low-tax low-spend (I don't, for avoidance of doubt) but also think Brexit was a stupid idea? There must surely be differences of opinion within the Tory Party, its members and supporters?

I'm sure there are differences of opinion. But you have to remember that, in the eyes of - probably most people outside the LibDems and some hard-core remainers, Brexit is a thing of the past. It happened a couple of years ago, and it's not going to be reversed, so it's not really the kind of thing that's worth arguing about. Personally, when I see people still trying to make out that all/most of the UK's woes are because of Brexit, that just leaves me with the sense of people still fighting yesterday's battles. apparently unable to move on and deal with the World as it is.

The other thing for me is that, I tend to see Brexit as - with hindsight - unavoidable. Yes, of course I'd prefer not to have had the hit to GDP that Brexit entailed, but given the EU's unwillingness to budge on freedom of movement, I don't think there was any sensible way we could have avoided Brexit, because there was just no way we could go on with the EU Freedom of Movement rules as they were. Maybe if Brexit negotiations had gone differently we could have had a less-bad Brexit deal, but I'm not convinced it would have made that much difference.

For that reason, it makes perfect sense to me that there's now very little discussion of Brexit within the Tories. Why argue over done-and-dusted things of the past when there are too many problems today to deal with?

 

[WelshBluebird]

For that reason, it makes perfect sense to me that there's now very little discussion of Brexit within the Tories. Why argue over done-and-dusted things of the past when there are too many problems today to deal with?

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
How can we as a country be successful if we aren't willing to look at our past and work out what went wrong?

Brexit is a thing of the past.

Except it isn't, for two reasons:

1. We are dealing with the direct consequences of it literally right now. Hell some of them only came into affect earlier this month.
2. There are still some direct consequences that haven't gone into effect just yet that will over the course of the next few years.

How is that "something that happened years ago"?

From the actual Brexit thread (and maybe this discussion needs to move there), Farage has literally just been complaining about people moving to other European countries from the UK and how the Brain Drain that involves is bad - yet makes absolutely zero connection to one of the major causes, Brexit. How can we continue to believe that such people are arguing in good faith when they raise problems that Brexit caused, but refuse to acknowledge it as a cause?

 

[WizCastro197]

Sunak has ordered an investigation/ethics probe into Zahawi:

Rishi Sunak orders investigation into Nadhim Zahawi tax row

Rishi Sunak says there are "questions that need answering" over the Conservative party chairman's tax affairs.

www.bbc.co.uk

How come he orders a review into Zahawi's tax evasion but not Braverman's breach of rules? Is it just because he was so pressured this time?

 

[Typhoon]

How come he orders a review into Zahawi's tax evasion but not Braverman's breach of rules? Is it just because he was so pressured this time?

Maybe he feels Zahawi is expendable?

 

[WizCastro197]

Maybe he feels Zahawi is expendable?

Ah, I didn't think about that one. He is a cabinet minister, but does he have the job where you don't do anything? But he also orders a review into Dominic Raab, deputy prime minister, but not the Home Secretary? His (Sunak's) actions are rather inconsistent.

 

[edwin_m]

Maybe he feels Zahawi is expendable?

Ah, I didn't think about that one. He is a cabinet minister, but does he have the job where you don't do anything? But he also orders a review into Dominic Raab, deputy prime minister, but not the Home Secretary? His (Sunak's) actions are rather inconsistent.

Keeping Braverman is probably a condition the ERG have imposed on him for not pulling the plug. Zahawi and Raab don't represent a faction in the same sort of way.

 

[Typhoon]

Ah, I didn't think about that one. He is a cabinet minister, but does he have the job where you don't do anything? But he also orders a review into Dominic Raab, deputy prime minister, but not the Home Secretary? His (Sunak's) actions are rather inconsistent.

He was the person who Johnson brought in to replace Sunak, when the latter resigned. I'm not sure that Zahawi was over supporting of Sunak's regime at the Treasury.

I'm not convinced that 'Deputy Prime Minister' is that important a position, it just sounds important. Most of them (and First Secretaries of State) hardly seem like rivals for the top job , Raab is no exception.

 

[nw1]

I'm sure there are differences of opinion. But you have to remember that, in the eyes of - probably most people outside the LibDems and some hard-core remainers, Brexit is a thing of the past. It happened a couple of years ago, and it's not going to be reversed, so it's not really the kind of thing that's worth arguing about. Personally, when I see people still trying to make out that all/most of the UK's woes are because of Brexit, that just leaves me with the sense of people still fighting yesterday's battles. apparently unable to move on and deal with the World as it is.

The other thing for me is that, I tend to see Brexit as - with hindsight - unavoidable. Yes, of course I'd prefer not to have had the hit to GDP that Brexit entailed, but given the EU's unwillingness to budge on freedom of movement, I don't think there was any sensible way we could have avoided Brexit, because there was just no way we could go on with the EU Freedom of Movement rules as they were. Maybe if Brexit negotiations had gone differently we could have had a less-bad Brexit deal, but I'm not convinced it would have made that much difference.

For that reason, it makes perfect sense to me that there's now very little discussion of Brexit within the Tories. Why argue over done-and-dusted things of the past when there are too many problems today to deal with?

Lots of assumptions here, for example we should never be able to reverse, or at least mitigate, bad decisions, and the assumption that freedom of movement is bad (which some of us utterly disagree with), which kind of proves my point. I don't want to get into a Brexit discussion (and we have been warned off that), so I will try and generalise my point to politics in general. Should all decisions made in the past be considered irreversible and not open to debate, however utterly ridiculous they are in the eyes of a significant part of the population?

Going on about "yesterday's battles" on any aspect of politics (again, I am trying to generalise this to any political issue) is basically patronising and denigrating those who think such battles are still worth fighting. It's basically the "I'm right, you're wrong, put up or shut up" argument. A device to paint the opposition to a given argument as "dinosaurs", living in the "bad old world" of the 70s/80s/90s/00s (delete as applicable).

Let's say some future government decided to close public footpaths outside national parks and other honeypot areas, due to landowners not being happy with people walking across their land and putting pressure on the government so to do. Let's then say that if people tried to debate the issue after the event, the government just told people to "put up or shut up" with the Brave New World of restricted countryside access and "stop fighting battles of the past". I think many people would be rightly angered by this and find the whole attitude patronising and condescending.

Let's also say some future government also decided to put in place some very heavy anti-strike legislation, let's say banning strike action by public sector key workers. Again should people objecting to this just put up or shut up with the Brave New World and "stop fighting yesterday's battles"?

Or for balance, let's say some future government implemented policies which those on the economic right thought were a bad idea, let's say completely unrestricted public spending on some aspect of the public sector. Should said people on the economic right also just "put up or shut up" with such policies and "stop fighting yesterday's battles"?

 

[DelayRepay]

I'm not convinced that 'Deputy Prime Minister' is that important a position, it just sounds important. Most of them (and First Secretaries of State) hardly seem like rivals for the top job , Raab is no exception.

It can't be that important - we've gone years at a time without having a Deputy Prime Minister. And even when we do have one, there's no constitutional basis for them to automatically take over from a Prime Minister who's incapacitated. Hence the mess we could have found ourselves in if Boris had not recovered from Covid back in 2020.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Lots of assumptions here, for example we should never be able to reverse, or at least mitigate, bad decisions, and the assumption that freedom of movement is bad (which some of us utterly disagree with), which kind of proves my point. I don't want to get into a Brexit discussion (and we have been warned off that), so I will try and generalise my point to politics in general. Should all decisions made in the past be considered irreversible and not open to debate, however utterly ridiculous they are in the eyes of a significant part of the population?

I think the answer is that some decisions are (approximately) reversible and others aren't. You gave a hypothetical example of closing public footpaths. If that happened, a campaign to reverse the decision would probably be a legitimate battle to fight because it would be easy for the Government to subsequently pass legislation re-opening the paths. But on the other hand, if the footpaths had been closed AND completely built over with new houses/shops/factories/etc., so that the previous paths no longer existed and it was now therefore impossible to re-open them, then it would be largely pointless (other than as a historical point of interest) to go on about how bad the decision to close them was and act as if you could re-open them. In that hypothetical case, it'd be correct to say that people campaigning to re-open the paths were fighting 'yesterday's battles'. (Although in that case, it may make sense to run a campaign to build some new footpaths instead. [*])

I would suggest Brexit is closer to the latter case, because it's never going to be possible to directly reverse Brexit. Theoretically, the UK could apply to join the EU (again), but that would take many years and we'd never get in with the same terms we had before, so it's pointless arguing and campaigning as if we could. That's the sense in which people are fighting yesterday's battles.

[*] There's a rather obvious railway analogy here that often crops up on these forums

 

[Bletchleyite]

I would suggest Brexit is closer to the latter case, because it's never going to be possible to directly reverse Brexit. Theoretically, the UK could apply to join the EU (again), but that would take many years and we'd never get in with the same terms we had before, so it's pointless arguing and campaigning as if we could. That's the sense in which people are fighting yesterday's battles.

However there are things we can do to make things closer to what they were, e.g. rejoin the Common Market in some form, be that EFTA or a dedicated negotiation.

 

[jfollows]

Maybe he feels Zahawi is expendable?

I think he does.
He's instigated an enquiry for two reasons, I think:

1. Sunak has an excuse for not discussing the issue any further, he was getting fed up of having to answer questions on the subject and on nothing else
2. Once the enquiry finds "something" he'll sack Zahawi

The question is why he hasn't already sacked Zahawi, but he hasn't and now there's an enquiry under way it wouldn't be good to sack him now, but I still think Zahawi's days are numbered.

You can't be Chancellor, be having an investigation into your personal tax affairs by HMRC, essentially lie about it at the time and then try and cover it up when details start to come out. If he'd been open and honest about it from the start he might have survived, but yet again the "one law for me, a different law for everyone else" aspect is going to doom him amongst other things.

 

[jon0844]

I fully expect that if Boris was to make another serious attempt at the leadership, those leaks would all start flowing again and he'd find himself having to hide in a fridge again.

I'd actually be happy if he kept hiding in a fridge, rather than using our money to fly to Ukraine every time he finds himself exposed in the media for something.

 

[The Ham]

Something which some have highlighted is that the Tax Payers Alliance have been very quiet on Zahawi, leading then to wonder why that is.

 

[Typhoon]

I think he does.
He's instigated an enquiry for two reasons, I think:

1. Sunak has an excuse for not discussing the issue any further, he was getting fed up of having to answer questions on the subject and on nothing else
2. Once the enquiry finds "something" he'll sack Zahawi

The question is why he hasn't already sacked Zahawi, but he hasn't and now there's an enquiry under way it wouldn't be good to sack him now, but I still think Zahawi's days are numbered.

You can't be Chancellor, be having an investigation into your personal tax affairs by HMRC, essentially lie about it at the time and then try and cover it up when details start to come out. If he'd been open and honest about it from the start he might have survived, but yet again the "one law for me, a different law for everyone else" aspect is going to doom him amongst other things.

2. It will be the enquiry that will effectively sack Zahawi. " I'm sorry but the enquiry has found ...."

It will make Sunak look weak but that is because he is in a weak position. I suspect Johnson pulled out of the race with Sunak in October(? - it feels so long ago) is that he wants Sunak to take all the flack for stealth tax rises, energy price hikes, 'cost of living', local election woes then he will ride to the rescue. If they are stupid, Conservative MPs will forget so many walked out on him; if we are stupid, we will forget Partygate, his shirking of Prime Ministerial tasks, the differences between what he says and what is actually happening, and vote for him, nevertheless. There will be a barrage of media support for him from certain quarters, bolstered by an advertising blitz about his spearheading of Covid vaccinations and how Brexit would have been done and we would be in the sunlit uplands if he hadn't been forces to stand down. I'm even surprised that we haven't had news about a forthcoming patter of tiny feet. Anything to distract from his incompetence.

 

[nw1]

Something which some have highlighted is that the Tax Payers Alliance have been very quiet on Zahawi, leading then to wonder why that is.

I think the answer to that is fairly obvious.

 

[Gloster]

According to The Grauniad, Lord Markham of East Horsley, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care, holds a 30% stake in a private health screening and COVID testing firm. Although it is not mentioned in his departmental biography, he has declared it in his register of interests; the register is supposed to be overseen by the ethics adviser, but that post has been vacant since Lord Geidt resigned in June. He seems to have been in the post for four months, which should be sufficient time to distance himself from company. As The Grauniad says, this raises ‘questions about the potential for a conflict of interest’.

A small scandal that will probably go unnoticed by most, but just another of the drip…drip…drip of dodgy incidents.

(Sorry, I can’t do a link.)

 

[DelayRepay]

I think he does.
He's instigated an enquiry for two reasons, I think:

1. Sunak has an excuse for not discussing the issue any further, he was getting fed up of having to answer questions on the subject and on nothing else
2. Once the enquiry finds "something" he'll sack Zahawi

The question is why he hasn't already sacked Zahawi, but he hasn't and now there's an enquiry under way it wouldn't be good to sack him now, but I still think Zahawi's days are numbered.

You can't be Chancellor, be having an investigation into your personal tax affairs by HMRC, essentially lie about it at the time and then try and cover it up when details start to come out. If he'd been open and honest about it from the start he might have survived, but yet again the "one law for me, a different law for everyone else" aspect is going to doom him amongst other things.

Is it possible Sunak doesn't want to be accused of hypocrisy, given his own tax affairs came under the spotlight not long ago due to his wife's non-dom status (although for clarity their tax arrangements were legal and no penalties had to be paid)? Perhaps he is worried that too much attention on who pays what tax could come back to bite him?

 

[WizCastro197]

According to The Grauniad, Lord Markham of East Horsley, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care, holds a 30% stake in a private health screening and COVID testing firm. Although it is not mentioned in his departmental biography, he has declared it in his register of interests; the register is supposed to be overseen by the ethics adviser, but that post has been vacant since Lord Geidt resigned in June. He seems to have been in the post for four months, which should be sufficient time to distance himself from company. As The Grauniad says, this raises ‘questions about the potential for a conflict of interest’.

A small scandal that will probably go unnoticed by most, but just another of the drip…drip…drip of dodgy incidents.

(Sorry, I can’t do a link.)

Don't worry, I will come to the rescue, as it is quite hard to find on the Guardian's website.

Conservative health minister has big stake in Covid testing firm

Exclusive: Nick Markham, who co- founded Cignpost Investments during the pandemic, was given a peerage by Liz Truss

www.theguardian.com

A Conservative health minister has a substantial financial stake in a private health screening and Covid testing firm, raising questions about the potential for a conflict of interest.

Nick Markham, a businessman who was given a peerage under Liz Truss and appointed to the health department, owns about 30% of Cignpost Investments and has done so throughout his first four months in the job.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

2. It will be the enquiry that will effectively sack Zahawi. " I'm sorry but the enquiry has found ...."

Don't bank on it unless Sunak has no need of him but his problem is he is politically naive. Mind you i never knew how he got any job in the first place the man is the worst sycophant going in the Tories hanging on the coat tails of whoever looks like winning. He spent weeks denying any wrongdoing threatened legal action against journalists yet now the truth is outed we know him for what he is.

The other thing to remember here is plenty of Tories been non dom at some point pre their political careers so they will all close ranks to protect each other.

 

[edwin_m]

Don't bank on it unless Sunak has no need of him but his problem is he is politically naive. Mind you i never knew how he got any job in the first place the man is the worst sycophant going in the Tories hanging on the coat tails of whoever looks like winning. He spent weeks denying any wrongdoing threatened legal action against journalists yet now the truth is outed we know him for what he is.

The other thing to remember here is plenty of Tories been non dom at some point pre their political careers so they will all close ranks to protect each other.

The problem here is that the Tories have basically run out of credible leaders.

 

[brad465]

If this is true and it got more traction in the media, it would be a contender for scandal of the century:

How Rishi Sunak’s Treasury helped Putin ally sue Bellingcat’s Eliot Higgins

UK Treasury, then under Rishi Sunak’s control, let Yevgeny Prigozhin circumvent sanctions to target Eliot Higgins

www.opendemocracy.net

The UK government helped the boss of Russia’s murderous mercenary army to circumvent its own sanctions and launch a targeted legal attack on a British journalist, openDemocracy can reveal.

Yevgeny Prigozhin is the founder of Wagner, a private army that the US government last week announced it would designate a “transnational criminal organisation”, allowing it to impose even tougher sanctions on the group. For years it has been accused of human rights abuses and war crimes in Ukraine and across the world in support of Putin’s regime.

Sanctions introduced in the UK and Europe in 2020 were supposed to prevent anyone from doing business with Prigozhin. He had also been sanctioned in the US in 2018.

But a vast cache of hacked emails shows that, under the leadership of Rishi Sunak, the UK Treasury issued special licences in 2021 to let the oligarch override sanctions and launch an aggressive legal campaign against a journalist in the London courts.

The notorious libel suit against Eliot Higgins personally followed revelations by his website Bellingcat about Wagner’s shadowy operations, and was part of Prigozhin’s strategy to undermine the sanctions against him.

The case collapsed in March 2022, in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But key details of how the sanctioned oligarch was able to pursue the legal attack have remained a secret until now.

An investigation by openDemocracy has found that:

• The government granted licences for a British law firm to work on the case, and approved key steps along the way;
• Sanctions prevented Prigozhin from coming to London, but the UK government gave permission for his British lawyers to fly business class to St Petersburg so they could meet face-to-face and finalise their legal attack on Higgins;
• Prigozhin paid his London lawyers directly via wire transfer from Russia, causing the UK bank to initially withhold funds due to sanctions;
• The London case was a key plank of his strategy to thwart the global sanctions.

The vast cache of hacked emails and documents from one of Russia’s biggest law firms was made available to openDemocracy and The Intercept, which first revealed other details from the hack.

It lays bare the incredible ease with which one of the world’s most notorious warmongers was able to use the UK legal system to try and further his aims, even while sanctioned.

Overriding sanctions can only be approved by a little-known department within the Treasury, called the Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI), so that people can have the right to legal representation where necessary.

 

[Gloster]

I'm not convinced that 'Deputy Prime Minister' is that important a position, it just sounds important. Most of them (and First Secretaries of State) hardly seem like rivals for the top job , Raab is no exception.

Didn’t Raab demand it as compensation for being downgraded from Foreign Secretary? It reveals a certain amount of weakness by Johnson, who probably didn’t care, and Sunak: stronger or better PMs would have told him where to get off. As far as Raab is concerned, it just reveals him to be a petty-minded title-hunter.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 Jan 2023 ==

If this is true and it got more traction in the media, it would be a contender for scandal of the century:

How Rishi Sunak’s Treasury helped Putin ally sue Bellingcat’s Eliot Higgins

UK Treasury, then under Rishi Sunak’s control, let Yevgeny Prigozhin circumvent sanctions to target Eliot Higgins

www.opendemocracy.net

It is in the Grauniad. It would be interesting to know if he is one of the Russians who have donated money to the Conservatives, although it is possible that they may have felt he was just too toxic to be seen as a donor. However, there are plenty of ways to channel money to a party so that they know who it really comes from, but it isn’t too obvious to the general public. Raab (him again) needs to answer questions about who allowed the lawyers to take on the work, although that might have occurred before he took over.

Scandal of the century? I bet there are bigger ones already coming to the boil.