THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Wealthy donors appear to be buying Government policy by securing “preferential” access to ministers and senior politicians, the standards watchdog has warned.
Sir Christopher Kelly said the perceived influence of rich businessmen over politicians is undermining public trust in Westminster. He cited the Coalition’s planning reforms as an example of a policy that raised suspicions after The Daily Telegraph disclosed that property developers were paying thousands of pounds for access to senior Tories.
Such preferential treatment leads to increasing concerns that there is “no smoke without fire”, the chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph.
“There is no doubt that significant donors do have preferential access to political decision makers,” he said. “The thought that anyone would give such a large sum of money to a party solely for altruistic reasons is quite a difficult one. The risk is policy being influenced in other, more subtle, ways because some people have access because they have given donations.
“There is a risk of it [influencing of policy by donors] happening and more importantly there is a public perception that it does happen.”
The comments by Sir Christopher amount to one of the most strident warnings yet that Britain’s political system is at risk of being corrupted by wealthy individuals. » | Christopher Hope, Senior Political Correspondent | Friday, January 06, 2012
