brexit
How Foreign Office and Development Aid Cuts Are Damaging Britain’s Reputation as a Serious Partner on the World Stage
In 2019, then Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab wrote an article in the Sunday Telegraph promising “enormous opportunities across the world” when the UK left the EU. “We will be a champion of the basic freedoms… and a doughty defender of the rules-based international system,” he claimed.
This was off the back of a Foreign Affairs Committee report, in which the then Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), had predicted a growing focus on Africa, a stepped-up engagement with Latin America, and the promise that the FCO would become “best equipped to meet our national security objectives”.
It all looked so promising.
Fast-forward five years, with a full-English Brexit, a pandemic, an invasion of Ukraine, and a 14% drop in the value of the pound against the dollar since the Conservatives first came into power (in May 2010, it was $1.45 to the pound. Today it stands at $1.25), the promises of yesteryear seem lacklustre in the cold light of today.
Dominic Raab promised that the UK would be a "defender of the rules-based international system” after Brexit. Photo: Ian Davidson/ Alamy
In a letter on 16 April this year, Sir Philip Barton, the Permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) wrote to the House of Commons’ Public Accounts Committee on the subject of Overseas Development Aid (ODA) reductions.
In it, he detailed “the damaging impact on relationships with partner governments and other donors and the overall damage to the FCDO’s reputation as a reliable donor” that Government cuts had had in recent years.
Barton outlined how, in 2022-23, Afghanistan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe received between £14.7 million and £39.8 million less than their initially allocated funds. Afghanistan’s ODA was initially set at £286 million but was reduced by 14%. Sudan saw a 40% cut, Ethiopia an 18% reduction, Nigeria a 17% decrease, and Zimbabwe a 35% decrease in funds.
In early 2024, the International Development Committee’s report on ‘the FCDO’s approach to sexual and reproductive health’ noted that the UK had “slashed its spending” on the issue, with devastating impact. The report described budgets cut “with little to no notice” with “the deepest impact on the most marginalised”. It concluded that this had damaged the “UK’s reputation as a credible and serious partner”.
Last year, the Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) also detailed in its report “UK aid under pressure” the past five years as being of “extraordinary turbulence”. Not least this was because “many UK aid officials were redeployed to support Operation Yellowhammer, the government’s contingency planning for a ‘no-deal Brexit’”.
Despite Raab’s promises of 2019, then, the real impact of Brexit was – the ICAI report outlined – the FCDO’s de-prioritisation of a range of development activities “including the UK’s engagement with United Nations (UN) agencies on humanitarian crises”.
Diverted Budgets
One of the reasons for these cuts and curtailments is that the UK Government paused all 'non-essential’ overseas aid spending for four months in 2022, due in part to the Home Office takeover of the budget for domestic asylum costs.
The Home Office then spent £2 billion more than initially allocated. As the ICAI noted, “aid spending on asylum seekers and refugees in the UK rose to £4.3 billion in 2023, constituting 28% of the (ODA) budget”.
This came at a time when the total ODA budget to the FCDO itself dropped between 2018 and 2022 by some 34% – down £3.8 billion. This has had a very real world impact. ODA funds to Africa are down 57%. Pakistan, once recipient of £331 million a year in aid in 2022 only received £58 million. The African Development Fund was cut from £177 million to £27 million.
As the latest 2022-23 FCDO annual report notes, managing “ODA budget pressures… has generated a level of uncertainty this year” which has “impacted FCDO staff around the world”.
FCO and DFID Merger
A good deal of the chaos can be laid at the feet of Boris Johnson.
In the early months of the pandemic, on 16 June 2020, the then Prime Minister announced the merger of the FCO and the Department for International Development (DFID) into the FCDO. He did so with the aim of streamlining the UK’s international engagement by combining diplomacy and development under a unified strategy. However, the transition appeared to have been chaotic and hurtful to Britain’s global diplomatic missions.
Ambitious integration plans were scaled back due to resource constraints, and the merger led to a loss of development expertise as many quit their posts or were laid off.
Critics have since raised concerns about reduced transparency, diminished focus on development outcomes, and an overarching impact on the quality and effectiveness of UK international aid as a consequence.
In June 2022, Boris Johnson announced the merger of the FCO and Department for International Development (DFID) into the FCDO. Photo: American Photo Archive/ Alamy
In previous comments to the Public Accounts Committee, Permanent Under-Secretary Barton has outlined how the merger led to a postponement or scaling-down of major British diplomatic initiatives designed to fulfil climate commitments, address health disparities, and promote economic reform around the world.
It’s little surprise that, in February 2022, the Government’s Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) found the FCDO’s agenda to be “overambitious and unachievable”.
Selling Assets
This accompanying squeeze on public finances has meant that the FCDO now stands accused of selling off its family silver – with sales of embassies in prime real estate getting eyed up for short-term debt repayments.
In 2018, the then FCO sold its Bangkok embassy for some £420 million to move into a modern tower block, leased until just 2034. Given there seems no apparent core maintenance budget for FCDO property, the profits from the sale were reported to have gone into new electrical wiring in the Paris embassy and refurbishments in Cairo, New Delhi and Washington.
In 2021, it was also reported that a chunk of the British embassy in Tokyo was sold to the Japanese firm Mitsubishi Estate Group. At the time, the details were not made public but, in 2023, the chair of the Public Accounts Committee was informed that the deal was for £685.7 million. The sale, in “one of the most prestigious areas of Tokyo”, led Japanese press to speculate that the land could be used for luxury apartments likely to sell for more than £30 million each.
The latest FCDO accounts also note some £10.4 million further assets “held for sale”, on top of “£3.4 million from the sale of property in Dar Es Salaam and £1.5 million from the sale of surplus land in Skopje”.
Meanwhile, costs to renovate the British Embassy in Washington were reported to have more than doubled, to £118.8 million, in part fuelled by asbestos removal fees. As the annual report notes, “the risks to maintaining our global estate… remain high”.
A Lack of Ministerial Support
Given the parlous state of the FCDO’s funding, it is strange, then, that FCDO Minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan was last heard calling for more funding – not for her department but for the Ministry of Defence.
In March, Trevelyan, the Minister for Indo-Pacific, wrote with Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat on LinkedIn that, “protecting ourselves requires investment”. She did not, however, appear to call for her own department to be given more funds.
With a seeming lack of leadership from the political sphere, it has led to disenchanted one-time FCDO stars to speak out.
Moazzam Malik, former director-general at the Foreign Office, recently co-penned a report that called for the UK “to do foreign affairs slightly differently, to modernise our approach”, including rebranding and facing its colonial legacy "head-on".
Others – still in the FCDO and speaking to Byline Times under conditions of anonymity – describe a depressing world of chronic under-investment, with more budget cuts looming with regards to staffing, travel, and other core costs.
All of this seems a far cry from the hubris of Dominic Rabb just five long years ago.
“When we leave the EU, there will be enormous opportunities across the world,” he claimed. When such opportunities will be realised, seems – at the moment – anyone’s guess.
What Conservative Brexit has done to Britain:
This is two and a half minutes of cogent, coherent argument from Stella Creasy, demonstrating how Conservatism has literally fought against the interests of us all: Let us hope that people now realise how Conservatives have disemboweled the country, much as they used to do to the empire… As has been said before, policies aren’t... Read more
Galloway announces WPGB will ‘contest every seat’ in next general election
Wide array of candidates includes cricketing star, former Labour councillors and Asian ex-UKIP MEP
George Galloway celebrating his Rochdale by-election win
Rochdale MP George Galloway is holding a press conference in Parliament Square, at the time of writing, to announce the selection of hundreds of Workers Party (WPGB) parliamentary candidates and that WPGB plans to “contest every seat in Great Britain” at the next general election.
Galloway will be flanked by over 150 new WPGB parliamentary candidates – including former England cricketer Monty Panesar, former UKIP MEP Amjad Bashir and several former Labour councillors.
Skwawkbox understands that Galloway has told a number of socialist MPs that WPGB will not stand against them – but that former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell, who is considered by many to have reinforced the antisemitism smear campaign against the left and who undermined Labour disastrously under Jeremy Corbyn on the issue of a second Brexit referendum, is among WPGB’s targets.
The list of candidates is below.
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A list of the planned election candidates for Galloway’s WP:
Barking – Hamid Shah
Battersea – Hazel James
Bexleyheath and Crayford – James Mutimer
Brent East – Raj Gill
Brent West – Nadia Klock
Brentford and Isleworth – Nisar Malik – former Labour councillor
Bromley and Biggin Hill – Eileen Mahony
Carshalton and Wallington – Dr Mian Faisal Akbar
Chingford and Woodford Green – Yousaff Khan
Croydon West – John Kouten
Dagenham and Rainham – Iqbal Sheikh
Dulwich and West Norwood – Zhafaran Malik Qayum
Ealing North – Sameh Habeeb – former Independent PPC, now joined Workers Party
Ealing Central and Acton – Nada Jarche
Ealing Southall – Mudhsuden Singh “Monty” Panesar – legendary Cricketer
Edmonton and Winchmore Hill – Seton During
Enfield North – Aishat Anifowoshe
Enfield Southgate – Adeel Ahmed
Erith and Thamesmead – Anthony Williams
Finchley and Golders Green – Mez Roth
Feltham and Heston – Cllr Amrit Mann – defecting Labour councillor
Hackney North and Stoke Newington – we will support Diane Abbott MP should she seek re-election as an Independent
Hackney South and Shoreditch – Leon Eshuru
Hampstead and Highgate – Ghias Ahmed
Hammersmith and Chiswick – Hassan Chahin Sabbir
Harrow East – Sarraj Farwani
Harrow West – Zulkiple Husin
Hayes and Harlington – Rizwana Karim
Hendon – Rasheed Sarpong
Hornsey and Friern Barnet – Dino Philippos
Ilford North – Shabaz Hussain
Ilford South – Golam Tipu
Islington North – we will support Jeremy Corbyn MP should he seek re-election as an Independent
Islington South and Finsbury – Nasreen Najeeb
Kensington and Bayswater – Garry Cattle
Kingston and Surbiton – Ali Abdulla
Mitcham and Morden – Mehmood Jamshed
Lewisham West and East Dulwich – Gwenton Sloley
Leyton and Wanstead – Adeel Ahmed Iqbal
Poplar and Limehouse – Kamran Khan
Romford – Asim Muhammad
Richmond Park – Kadira Tas
Queen’s Park and Maida Vale – Irakli Menabde
Southgate and Wood Green – Christopher Menon
Stratford and Bow – Halima Khan
Streatham and Croydon North – Mohammad Sherwani
Sutton and Cheam – Bert Schouwenburg
Tooting – Tarik Hussein
Tottenham – Jennifer Obaseki
Twickenham – Umair Malik
Uxbridge and South Ruislip – Steve Blewitt
Vauxhall and Camberwell Green – Darren Jones
Walthamstow – Imran Arshad
West Ham and Beckton – Hassan Morsy
Wimbledon – Aaron Mafi
Bethnal Green and Stepney – we will support Mohammad Akunjee who is standing as an Independent
Holborn and St Pancras – we will support Andrew Feinstein should he choose to run as an Independent
East Ham – we will support Tahir Mirza who is standing as a Newham Independent
Workers Party of Britain – North West Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Ashton-under-Lyne – Aroma Hassan
Bury North – Shafat Ali
Stalybridge and Hyde – Audel Shirin
Stockport – Ayesha Khan
Manchester Central – Chris Turner
Blackburn – Craig Murray – former British ambassador
Rochdale – George Galloway MP – Party Leader
Bolton South and Walkden – Jack Khan – former Labour Councillor
Wythenshawe and Sale East – John Barstow
Hazel Grove – Johnny Sheen
Wigan – Nasri Barghouti – of the Barghouti family
Oldham East and Saddleworth – Shanaz Siddique
Cheadle – Tanya Manzoor
Liverpool Garston – we will support Sam Gorst who is standing as a Liverpool Community Independent
Liverpool Wavertree – we will support nurse Ann San who is standing as an Independent
Stretford and Urmston – Dr Kalima Choudhury
Crewe and Nantwich – Phillip Lane
Fylde – Robert William Perks
Hyndburn – Matthew Britcliffe
Westmorland and Lonsdale – Garry Cattle Boon
Whitehaven and Workington – Derek Ray
Sefton Central – Gareth O’Leary
Wallasey – Philip Anthony Bimpson
Knowsley – Graham Padden
Liverpool West Derby – Mohamed El-Gadhy
Workers Party of Britain – North East Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West – we will support Yvonne Ridley who is standing as an Independent
Stockton West – Natalie Potter
Blaydon and Consett – Mark Logan
Newton Aycliffe and Spennymoor – Minhajul Suhon
Hartlepool – Thomas Dudley
Newcastle upon Tyne East and Wallsend – Muhammed Ghori
Tynemouth – William George Jarrett
Workers Party of Britain – Yorkshire Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Bradford South – Harry Boota – former UKIP candidate
Colne Valley – Adam Steel
Spen Valley – Terrance Sankarsingh
Keighley and Ilkley – Vasim Shabir
Leeds West and Pudsey – Amjad Bashir
Dewsbury and Batley – Arshad Ali
York Central – John Lavender
Kingston upon Hull East – John Paul Stonehouse
Workers Party of Britain – West Midlands Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Tipton and Wednesbury – Abdul Husen
Dudley – Aftab Hussein
Rugby – Paul Paphiti
Stoke-on-Trent North – Carla Elizabeth Parrish
Telford – Allan Bailey
Coventry South – Dr Mohammed Ali Syed
Aldridge-Brownhills – Hamza Muhammad Ahmed Ibrahim
Coventry East – Paul Bedson
Burton and Uttoxeter – Zahid Mahmood
Kingswinford and South Staffordshire – George V Price
Nuneaton – Khalil Ahmed
Redditch – Mohammed Amin
Stafford – Allan Vernon Gray
West Bromwich – Rohim Mohammed
Birmingham Yardley – Mohammed Shuhel Miah
Workers Party of Britain – East Midlands Prospective Parliamentary Candidates
as of 30th April 2024
Derby South – Chris Williamson – former Labour MP
Leicester South – we will support Shockat Patel who is running as an Independent
Corby and East Northamptonshire – Callan Barrett Page
Derby North – Imran Hamid
Mid Derbyshire – Josiah Uche
Lincoln – Linda Richardson
Bolsover – Jack Evans
North West Leicestershire – Jevan Heatherley
Broxtowe – Syed Maqsood
Kettering – Thomas Dudfield
Northampton North – Khalid Razzaq
Leicester East – we will support Claudia Webbe MP if she runs again as an Independent
South Northamptonshire – Mick Stott
Workers Party of Britain – South West Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
North East Somerset and Hanham – Kathleen Haskard
Glastonbury and Somerton – Angela Henderson
Torbay – Paul Moor
Weston-super-Mare – Paul David Spencer
Plymouth Sutton and Devonport – Dr Guy Haywood
Yeovil – Nidal Shah
Bournemouth East – Dr Wayne Adlem
Chippenham – Jubin Jomon
Bristol South – Joji Mathew
Forest of Dean – Nicola Aylin Duke
Workers Party of Britain – South East Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Hove and Portslade – we will support Tanushka Marah who is standing as an Independent
Aylesbury – Jan Gajdos
Brighton Pavilion – Don Goghrod
Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven – Elaine Ghoneim
Havant – Jennifer Alemanno
Gillingham and Rainham – Laid Ghellab
Rochester and Strood – John Innes
Slough – Khalid Kazim
Crawley – Linda Bamieh
Romsey and Southampton North – Sahrae Cunio
Bracknell – Samuel Munyeza
Spelthorne – Umair Malik
Epsom and Ewell – Ahsan Ulah
Workers Party of Britain – East Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Mid Norfolk – Simon Blackwell
North West Norfolk – Karl Wilkin
South West Hertfordshire – Muhammed Pervez Khan
Harpenden and Berkhamsted – Sina Gharib
Chelmsford – Mark Kenlen
Workers Party of Britain – Wales Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Bangor Aberconwy – John Malcolm Humberstone
Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare – Anthony Cole
Llanelli – David Mark Evans
Torfaen – Mohd Najmul Alam Shabuj
Dwyfor Meirionnydd – Tomas Owen
Cardiff West – Akil Kata
Alyn and Deeside – Taghrid Al-Mawed
Workers Party of Britain – Scotland Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (Wave 1)
as of 30th April 2024
Gordon and Buchan – Craig Proctor
Glasgow South – Nick Stewart
Glasgow East – Maximilian Owen
Livingston – Danielle Mclean
Mid Dunbartonshire – Kevin Riley
Paisley and Renfrewshire North – Majd Eddin Bashar Helmi
Aberdeen North – Neil Healy
Glenrothes and Mid Fife – William Alexander Rankine
North East Fife – Andrew Strachan
Questions raised over pro-Trump, anti-BLM, anti-Labour comments of Labour candidate
Joe Johnson’s social media record includes defence of racist comedy, admiration of Thatcher and Trump, support for far-right views and opposition to Labour – yet he has been selected to stand for the party
Sefton council candidate Joe Johnson, from his Facebook profile
A Labour candidate’s social media output has raised serious questions about his suitability to stand – yet he was apparently waved through by Keir Starmer’s party, either without vetting or in disregard of his record, to stand for the party in the St Oswald ward in Bootle, near Liverpool.
Locals have raised flags about what they say are:
- Historic racist views
- Support of Boris Johnson and the Conservative Party
- Admiration of Margaret Thatcher
- Support of Donald Trump
- Support of far right views on social media (TwitterlX: @joejbsg)
- Public opposition to the Labour Party
In 2020, the BBC reported that a Dover footballer, who was racially abused by Hartlepool fans, said that Johnson had implied he earned the abuse by celebrating his goal:
The ref was saying that I sparked it all off with my celebration. As a ref, you shouldn’t really be saying … it’s sort of saying that, because I did a celebration, I should now be receiving racial abuse.
In the same month the BBC was reporting the Hartlepool incident, Johnson was commenting on his social media that police should be baton-beating and tasing Black Lives Matter protesters:
Johnson also defended the police after video emerged of a Black man being kneed in the face – commenting that the police ‘should be allowed to do their jobs’:
Johnson also commented that ‘blackface’ was ‘comedy at its best’:
In 2019, he supported Boris Johnson over Brexit and in 2020 he defended Johnson’s appalling handling of the pandemic and his wilful ignoring of the advice of government scientists:
And on Brexit he went further, supporting a far-right account’s recommendation that Johnson should invoke emergency legislation to force through a hard Brexit:
Johnson needn’t have bothered: the sabotage by Keir Starmer and the Labour right handed Johnson the hardest of Brexits anyway. He was also apparently a fan of the hated Margaret Thatcher, ‘liking’ a post calling her an ‘inspiration’:
Johnson praised far-right former US president Donald Trump more than once:
And his ‘likes’ included an anti-refugee post by far-right political figures Nigel Farage and former Home Secretary Priti Patel:
Johnson’s likes and comments also indicate a deep distaste for Labour under Jeremy Corbyn – and approval for a video mocking Diane Abbott, Britain’s first Black woman MP:
Johnson’s ‘like’ of a post about Abbott
Contacted for comment about his posts an locals’ concerns, Johnson replied:
I am not surprised, although disappointed by putting myself up for local election to help the area that some people would try and shoot me down for past views, beliefs and opinions.
Labour’s regional director for the north-west, Liam Didsbury, did not respond to a request to confirm whether Labour did any vetting before allowing Johnson to become a candidate.
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I’d rather be French…
This vox pop is an indictment of 14 painful years of Conservative government: So that youth can get some of its future back let us hope that Labour will feel confident enough to properly embrace what looks like the incipient reinstigation of free movement for the young – led by the European Commission! That would... Read more
Brexit Ruined the Stock Market – and Not Even Rejoining the EU Will Fix It
Brexit "wrecked" the London stock market and the "consequences have been disastrous", a leading writer on the economy has said while suggesting the level of underperformance is so "serious and astonishing" it should be front-page news and a source of "anguish debates" in parliament and in the media.
Simon Nixon, one time chief leader writer for The Times, former chief European commentator on the Wall Street Journal and the author of The Wealth of Nations Substack, gave a deeply sobering analysis of Britain's financial failings on the latest Byline Times Podcast, out now.
He spoke with host Adrian Goldberg after publishing a post on April 8 headlined - 'How Brexit Wrecked the Stock Market' - which labelled the decline so "shocking" that it is "no longer a global humiliation but a national crisis". And, he warned: "Bad policy choices threaten to make it worse."
The London stock exchange has been underperforming since Brexit and shows few signs it will recover. Photo: PA Images / Alamy
"Sometimes you don’t appreciate what you have got until it is gone. How soon before Britons wake up to the national disaster that is unfolding in the stock market," Nixon asked at the start of his post. Rather than an example of "British exceptionalism", the FTSE 100 is now the "exception" to a global recovery, he noted, explaining how, since the beginning of January, it is up just 2.4%. US shares are up almost 10%. Japan over 18%. Germany 9%.
But, the sluggishness and stagnation isn't new, UK stocks have been "dramatically underperforming against the rest of the world since the Brexit referendum", he wrote. As an example, Nixon noted on his Substack, that a £100 investment in the FTSE 100 in June 2016 would now be worth £118. The same investment in the US would be worth £250; Italy, £189. UK equities currently trade at a 20% discount to the broader European market on a price-to-earnings basis and a 15% per cent discount on a price-to-book basis - both near decades’ lows, Nixon added. Before Brexit, they traded at a premium. Poor valuations in London have also contributed to a collapse in the number of listed companies - down nearly 50% in 2023 alone - and new listings have "almost entirely dried up".
Nixon's assessment on the current state of play: "The stock market is sending a devastating message about the way that Britain is perceived among global investors. No amount of boosterish bluster can hide the fact that Britain is a global outlier, nor should anyone be under any illusions about the consequences for the economy if this underperformance continues. This is no longer just an issue of concern for a few highly paid bankers in the City. It is an issue that goes to the heart of Britain’s economic model and long-term prospects."
Nixon told the Byline Times Podcast that the success of the stock market made London "the financial centre of Europe and the world", so what is happened now, "is a matter of huge consequence" and has "profound implications for Britain's future economic model".
"It means that a part of the economic model of Britain that people have taken for granted, is changing. And that is something we need to confront and think about."
In his Substack post, Nixon said the stock market is being "de-globalised, a historic reversal of a decades-long trend". Investors, he told the Byline Times Podcast, are now "shunning" London because of Brexit and the "political chaos" that came with it: "Britain has become an unattractive, risky place to invest your money". Now that money is managed globally, and London is about 4% of the global equity pool, "it's an easy one to skip if you just don't like the look of it".
"The irony is that it was the very success of the stock market that sowed the seeds of the current crisis," Nixon wrote on his Substack where he went on to explain how as the wealth of London grew, so to did "resentment across the country, fuelled by the global financial crisis of 2008 and subsequent bailouts".
The City's wealth never "trickled down", inequalities grew and "this resentment was unquestionably a key factor in the Brexit vote of 2016, when half the country exacted their revenge on what they considered an arrogant global elite".
The stock market, Nixon explained, not only helped to define Britain's economy but it also shaped the politics "contributing to this lopsided economy", and in a sense became "a victim of its own success".
While Brexit voters were fuelled in part by "resentment", Brexiteers, were ignorant, and took the City for granted, Nixon said: "I think they'd come to assume that it was something inherent in Britain that it was a British exceptionalism that Britain just had the City back it always did."
Rather, Nixon explained to the Byline Times Podcast, "the City has come less to rely on British exceptionalism, but has come to depend, actually, on it being anchored in this giant single market. And that was something that wasn't understood. It clearly wasn't understood because Boris Johnson and his Brexit deal, didn't even try to seek a deal for the City."
On 23 June 2016, 51.9% of Brits voted in favour of the leaving the EU, but that didn't actually happen until 31 January 2020. The stock market's underperformance, Nixon said, "really starts to kick in, in June 2016, and it's never recovered".
The demise of the stock market, Nixon told the podcast, puts an entire ecosystem at risk, including lawyers and bankers, accountants, brokers and PR advisers who are also "sitting there looking at empty profit pools".
Goldberg pointed out that the British public, battling a cost of living crisis, probably wouldn't have much sympathy for people in highly-paid positions, before Nixon explained that without their contributions government spending on public services would be impacted, making things worse for everyone.
Nixon said he'd been writing about the underperformance of the stock market since Brexit, and the response had been that once the deal was done, "the gap will close", or that once the Conservatives "get a stable government" foreign bidders will come in, "but it's not happening, and it hasn't happened".
The journalist said arguments over regulations and tax incentives, were missing the point, as "this is primarily a sentiment problem first and foremost, and it's hard to see how one escapes that". The issue, Nixon said, is "something that has been alarming people in the City now for several years."
Goldberg questioned Nixon about whether rejoining the European Union could help solve the problem, but the writer didn't think that would ever happen, and explained to even "get to that point, would take years and would be hugely, politically contested, creating more instability". Nixon noted in his Substack that the fallout from Brexit is onluy "destined to get worse" as the grace periods in Johnson's exit-deal expire, and as EU regulators attempt to lure more business from London.
Nixon said Labour's challenge when they - in all likelihood become the next Government - will be to not fix the problem, but to stop things from "getting worse".
And the bigger danger, Nixon wrote on Substack, is that history will repeat, that "the stock market will shape Britain’s future, just as it did its past".
The Orbánisation of British Politics: Farage and Braverman Headline with Hungarian Prime Minister at National Conservatism Conference
Suella Braverman and Nigel Farage have been announced as speakers alongside Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at this year’s National Conservatism Conference (NatCon) in Brussels next week.
Braverman also spoke at last year's UK event with other Conservative politicians including Michael Gove, Miriam Cates and Danny Kruger. Last year the Byline Times reported on NatCon's links to Orbán, US billionaire Peter Thiel, and the organisations funding this effort to mainstream Christian Nationalism.
The line-up for this year’s NatCon Brussels further demonstrates Orbán’s influence on the right of European politics and also includes many speakers with links to radical right networks in Europe and the US who aim to roll back reproductive and sexuality rights.
Toby Young’s Free Speech Union (FSU) is again well represented at NatCon, demonstrating the organisation's links to the movement.
James Orr and Matthew Goodwin both spoke at NatCon UK and are speaking again in Brussels. Orr was chair of NatCon UK, and is UK chair of the Edmund Burke Foundation (EBF) which is the organisation behind NatCon.
The FSU’s Frank Ferudi is also speaking. Ferudi, formerly of the Revolutionary Communist Party, is the Executive Director of the Brussels branch of the Hungarian government-backed college Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC). Furedi told Politico that his position at MCC Brussels was “a chance to fight back in the culture wars” in an article that labelled him “Orban’s attack dog”.
In May 2022, Furedi also spoke at the US-based Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) hosted in Budapest. CPAC is an annual conference organised by the American Conservative Union (ACU), the foremost Republican organisation in the US.
Another NatCon speaker Ralph Gert Schoellhammer is a Visiting Fellow at MCC Budapest. He is also a writer for UnHerd, Spiked, and the European Conservative and a regular on GB News and Talk TV.
NatCon features several other speakers from institutes backed by the Hungarian Government. John O'Sullivan is president of the Danube Institute, a Hungarian conservative think tank that receives state funding, and Rob Dreher is a fellow of the institute. Another speaker Gladden Pappin is president of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs, Hungary’s foreign policy research institute of state.
NatCon has been linked to the brand of Christian Nationalism adopted by the radical right in the US. Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation who spoke at NatCon UK 2023 is an author of Project 2025 which sets out the agenda for a second Trump presidency, including policies that would “rescind regulations prohibiting discrimination” and roll back access to abortion and contraception with a “focus on strengthening marriage and sexual risk avoidance.”
Speaking at NatCon 2024, Paul Coleman is the executive director of Alliance Defending Freedom International (ADF) and a lawyer. The Southern Poverty Law Center based in the US which monitors far-right activity has labelled the ADF as a hate group. The organisation was also named in an EU report Tip of the Iceberg (TOTI) as being a key organisation in a Europe-wide network involved in funnelling US and Russian dark money into religious extremism with the aim of rolling back reproductive and sexuality rights. Between 2008 and 2019 ADF spent over $23,000,000 on anti-gender campaigning across Europe.
ADF’s UK entity has recently ramped up lobbying in Westminster, according to analysis by the Observer the latest financial accounts for ADF UK show it spent almost £1m in the year to June 2023, up from £392,556 in 2020, and that its income almost doubled between 2022 and 2023, from £553,823 to £1,068,552.
Another NatCon speaker Ladislav Ilčić MEP is a Croatian politician who represents Hrvatski suverenisti (Croatian Sovereigntists) and is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group (ECR).
Ilčić also attended the European Congress of Families conference (ECF) held in Croatia in September 2023 which featured speakers from other key organisations named in the TOTI report including Brian Brown of the International Organization of the Family which is directly linked to Russian oligarchs who have been under western sanctions since the annexation of Crimea. In 2014 Brown organised a conference inside the Kremlin palace.
Other ECF speakers included Conservative MPs Miriam Cates and Ranil Jayawardena. ECF was organised by the ECR which contains factions of socially conservative, right-wing populist, liberal-conservative, Christian democratic, far-right, and national conservative parties.
Three other members of the ECR are also speaking at NatCon 2024, co-chairman Ryszard Legutko from Poland, Dutch independent MEP Rob Roos, and Vice President Hermann Tertsch del Valle-Lersundi who is a member of the Spanish VOX Political Party which is named in the TOTI report as being part of the $700,000,000 anti-gender network.
European politicians at NatCon 2024 also include members of the Identity and Democracy Party, Tom Vandendriessche of Belgium's Vlaams Belang party who although described themselves as centre-right are widely considered to be on the far right, and Patricia Chagnon, an MEP representing Marie Le Pen's National Rally party.
Other NatCon speakers include:
Melanie Phillips, columnist for The Times and the Jewish News Syndicate, and regular on the BBC is also speaking at the conference.
So too is Uzay Bulut, a Turkish journalist and political analyst who is a distinguished senior fellow at the Gatestone Institute, accused of being a hate group and fake news publisher that has received funding from the Mercer Family Foundation run by the billionaire Mercer family who also funded Cambridge Analytica. The Gatestone Institute has ties to the British 'think tanks' the Henry Jackson Society and Policy Exchange as reported by the Byline Times.
Also speaking is German aristocrat Gloria von Thurn und Taxis who worked closely with conservative Traditionalist Catholic leaders within the church and former Trump advisor Steve Bannon, with whom she planned to set up a school to educate and train right-wing Catholics.
The conference's special guest is Gerhard Ludwig Müller, a German Cardinal of the Catholic Church who has courted controversy for public criticism of Pope Francis stating that the Pope has “uttered plenty of material heresies”.
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This FT half hour film itemises and demonstrates what a disaster Brexit is. Not only for trade and industry but also for simple collaborative relations. And even, at the end of the piece, as Martin Wolf suggests, for democracy… Rather similarly, Geert Wilders has publicly abandoned the policy of the Netherlands leaving the EU saying.... Read more
Debunking the Debanking Scandal: Is Farage Being Helped by Figures Inside the Conservative Party?
At Prime Minister’s Questions this week, Rishi Sunak was put on the spot by Sir Keir Starmer. He was asked if he would welcome Nigel Farage back into the Tory fold, 30 years after he quit the Conservative Party over John Major’s decision to sign up to the Maastricht Treaty which promised deeper EU integration.
An angry Sunak avoided a direct answer. He is busy trying to persuade Lee Anderson, a former Tory deputy chairman, not to defect to the party Farage now supports, Reform. Tory moderates want Anderson, accused of Islamophobia, to go.
Farage meanwhile, ever the mischief-maker, is keeping his powder dry: he may emerge as the head of Reform and challenge the Tories at the coming election or he may not. If he does, then the likelihood of a major split on the right, with a divided vote, threatens the Tories’ very existence. It’s that serious.
Or the Tories could eat humble pie and welcome him back - better to have him on the inside than out. But that would be tantamount to a takeover by the right, the One Nation rump would be left high and dry. They could quit en masse.
Farage, entrant terrible, stirrer of anti-Tory, anti-Sunak unrest is enjoying every minute. Sunak, it seems, can trust no one. It appears even his ministerial colleagues, those he has promoted, are in private touch with his enemy. Look at Andrew Griffith, who was Economic Secretary to the Treasury – the City Minister responsible for financial services – and played a key role in the demise of the first woman to head a High Street bank.
Alison Rose and the NatWest Non-Scandal
On 18 July last year, Dame Alison Rose was in Downing Street for the launch of the Prime Minister’s new Business Council. The chief executive of NatWest Group, she was one of Britain’s most senior bankers, and a member of the Business Council, the newly created group of 14 British business leaders who would meet with Sunak to help “turbocharge economic growth”. She was photographed, laughing and joking with Sunak in the Number Ten garden at the unveiling.
Rose was already well-known and fondly regarded in Government circles – she was also co-chair of the government’s Energy Efficiency Taskforce and a member of the Net Zero Council.
Yet a week later, Rose was gone, forced to resign for unwittingly confirming to BBC journalist Simon Jack that Farage was a client of Coutts, the private bank owned by NatWest.
Farage had previously gone public, claiming he had been ‘debanked’ by a private bank because of his political views. Suspicion immediately landed on Coutts - the leading private bank was named in the media and on social media - but there was no official confirmation.
Rose was asked repeatedly at a dinner by Jack about Farage’s claim that “the bank says it was a commercial decision, I say it was political.” Rose said it was commercial, not political. In so doing, she acknowledged Farage was a Coutts customer and broke the banking code of confidentiality.
It was a genuine slip. Her board retained confidence in her.
The Government Shareholder Steps In
The Government was NatWest’s biggest shareholder. Griffith, then City Minister, had his officials call the NatWest Chair, Sir Howard Davies, and say the Government wanted her out for having discussed a client’s financial affairs with a BBC journalist.
Rose was a popular, highly-rated CEO, with an impressive track record. This was a first mistake, an inadvertent error. Nevertheless, after the call from Griffith’s office, Davies had to tell Rose: the largest shareholder, with 38.6% of the shares, wanted her out, in which case she was effectively toast.
The whole affair was hugely wounding for Rose. It was highly damaging for NatWest which had to find a successor. It raised questions about Coutts and the bank’s policies. The cause of advancing women in the City was knocked back. Sunak’s prestige Business Council was undermined before it had got off first base.
Griffith, it transpires, was in secret contact with Farage and had known for several weeks what the maverick politician was planning.
Farage privately lobbied Griffith for assistance with his debanking complaint against Coutts, asking the minister for advice “before I go public”.
WhatsApp messages disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act show Farage contacted Griffith, to discuss Coutts’ closure of his accounts because of his politics.
A message sent by Farage shortly before 1 am on 28 April 2023 said: “Thanks for making contact. Yes, a chat would be useful”. A further message sent just before noon the same day read: “Dear Andrew, when you have 5 minutes do let me know.”
Twelve days later Farage got in touch again, saying: “Be keen to discuss my legal position with you before I go public on this.”
The Treasury confirmed that a telephone conversation between Farage and Griffith had subsequently taken place with a civil servant present.
Griffith’s WhatsApp replies to Farage were not available since the minister used the app’s ‘disappearing messages’ function to ensure they were erased.
An independent review by lawyers for NatWest later found that Coutts had a “contractual right” to shut Farage’s accounts and did so because the bank was losing money by keeping him on as a client. It was a business decision, based on his banking activity and not his politics. The lawyers identified “serious failings” but added that it had not discriminated against him.
Soon after Rose’s departure was announced, Griffith sent an early morning WhatsApp to selected members of the media with the message: “I hope the whole financial sector learns from this incident.”
It was reported that to some journalists he claimed, “V for victory”, although this was denied.
Debunking the Debank
Emily Thornberry, the shadow attorney general, accused Farage and Griffith of secretly plotting together before the launch of the former Ukip leader’s debanking campaign.
“No one who has been following British politics for the last three decades will be remotely surprised to see this Tory government secretly conspiring behind the scenes with Nigel Farage to support each other’s campaigns and attacks,” she said.
Yes, but it surely raises further serious questions. Why did Farage single out Griffith? Did the successful businessman turned Boris Johnson supporter and former chair of the advisory board of the right-wing Centre for Policy Studies, inform his boss, Sunak, as to what was going on? What else was Farage in the habit of contacting him about? Is Farage in private touch with other Tory ministers?
Crucially, why did Griffith not alert Rose as to what was occurring? He clearly had insight of Farage’s plans. Rose and her team could have been better prepared; her conversation with the BBC might have been avoided. Her job and her position on the Prime Minister’s Business Council would have been saved.
Griffith, don’t forget, was not just a minister he was representing the largest shareholder in NatWest. The bank, and with it the taxpayers’ investment, suffered as a result of Rose’s going. Talking to Farage, knowing what was coming and doing nothing – it seemed an odd way for a shareholder to behave.
He was able to witness the launch of the Business Council, and was aware of the value attached to Rose by Sunak and the government yet did absolutely nothing to assist her.
His loyalty is questionable. It must beg the question as to who really calls the shots in this Conservative administration. Is it the beleaguered Sunak, the Prime Minister and official leader, or is there another, in waiting?
Government itself has ensured that it is dysfuntional:
What is further remarkable is that the inspector of BorderForce is the only ‘services’ inspector who does not have the right to publish his own reports – for an immigration obsessed government, well, That is clearly a desire to control the narrative and how…... Read more