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19 April 2007

Follow the money

The Tory who lent David Cameron's party millions but pays no tax and retains his peerage

By Martin Bright

So Lord Laidlaw, who lent the Tories £3.5 million, is refusing to give up his tax exile status (he lives in Monaco) despite that being a condition of his peerage. The best piece on this is by David Hencke in the Guardian.

To his credit David Cameron has told his renegade peer to get his act together, but, as I understand it, there is nothing anyone can do if Laidlaw chooses to remain a tax exile and a Lord. As I wrote in this week’s New Statesman the Tories and their money should become an increasingly fruitful avenue for exploration by journalists. Interesting, though, that this doesn’t seem to have come from the Labour Party, who are still hamstrung by the Prime Minister’s own issues with party funding.

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