Keir Starmer has finally understood that not everything that is legal is presentable. The prime minister has begun to let go of ballast, to try to leave behind the scandal that has followed him almost since his mandate began: more than 120,000 euros in clothes, designer glasses, soccer passes and concert tickets. All free. Gifts from Labor Party donors, such as businessman Waheed Ali.
The prime minister’s team has announced that Starmer will return more than 7,100 euros of those gifts to the people and companies that donated them to him. These are the gifts whose legality is being most questioned. Four tickets to see the singer Taylor Swift, worth 3,334 euros, courtesy of Universal Music Group. Two more for the same concert, given by the Football Association, valued at 712 euros. Four passes for the Doncaster horse races, the price of which amounted to 2,300 euros. And, finally, about a thousand euros for renting clothes from the Edeline Lee brand for his wife, Victoria Starmer.
The prime minister has also committed to tightening the current Code of Conduct that establishes the ethical standards that members of the Government must follow.
The Labor Government already made it clear, at the beginning of last week, that none of its ministers would accept gifts or use donor money for personal expenses again. Not only Starmer, but also the Minister of the Economy, Rachel Reeves, and the Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner, had received benefits from Waheed Alli, the businessman of Asian origin who has been giving hundreds of thousands of pounds to the Labor Party for years.
The majority of these donations were recorded in the House of Commons register of interests. Some, however, had not been fully detailed, to camouflage that they were clothing or other items for personal use. They appeared listed as “aid for the performance of professional tasks.”
But its legality did not manage to reduce the irritation of many party members and voters, who heard this news at the same time that the Government warned them about harsh social cuts, such as the elimination of aid to pensioners on gas and electricity bills. .
The shadow of the scandal clouded the Labor congress held last week in Liverpool. The meeting, which was to be the occasion to celebrate the electoral victory of July 4, was largely dedicated, at least in the corridors, to discussing the first entanglements of the Starmer team.
The businessman, investigated
Starmer’s decision to return the money for part of the gifts has coincided with the announcement of the opening of an investigation into businessman Alli, who has belonged to the House of Lords since former Prime Minister Tony Blair granted him that privilege. .
The House Ethical Standards Commission is investigating alleged irregularities by the billionaire in his declaration of the registry of interests, although parliamentary sources indicate that these would be issues related to the offices of his companies. Nothing to do with all the gifts that Alli gave to his friends in Downing Street.
