UK Politics

The son of Egypt’s former president said Tuesday that he and family members were innocent of corruption charges made in international courts after the country’s 2011 popular uprising. His statements came after years of attempts by the deposed president’s family to rehabilitate its image as it faced litigation in Egypt and abroad. In a video statement released online, Gamal Mubarak, the son of former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, said that recent court decisions in the European Union and elsewhere demonstrate their innocence, but did not explain how the family had amassed its significant wealth. In February, a massive leak of Credit Suisse clients’ information showed Gamal Mubarak and his brother, Alaa, to have held at least $197.5 million in the bank at one point in time. “The facts have now been established, and the false allegations have been unequivocally rebutted. The historical record has thus been independently and judicially corrected,” he said in a video statement released on YouTube. He blamed Egyptian judicial authorities for taking the issue to international courts. The 2011 protests were built on calls for an end to deep-rooted embezzlement and government corruption in Egypt, and growing concerns that Gamal Mubarak would be set up to succeed his father, who was in power for nearly 30 years. The international anti-corruption group Transparency International has estimated that as president, Mubarak stole some $70 billion in public funds. The former president died in 2020, aged 91.In April, Swiss prosecutors decided not to file charges after concluding a decade-long investigation into alleged money laundering and organized crime linked to linked to Mubarak’s circles in Egypt. They also said they would release some 400 million Swiss francs – $430 million – frozen in Swiss banks. The same month, the General Court of the European Union ruled that the rights of Mubarak’s wife, two sons and their wives had not been respected during an local Egyptian investigation of his assets, on which the prosecution was depending. The ruling meant EU sanctions on the Mubaraks’ accounts were deemed unlawful, and lifted. Gamal Mubarak said his family was being reimbursed for their legal costs related to the case. Transparency International condemned the move, saying it would show corrupt leaders around the world that they can act with impunity. The EU and Swiss investigations were part of a series of court proceedings against the Mubaraks in the wake of the mass protests. The father and the two sons were first detained in April 2011, two months after the uprising forced Mubarak to step down as part of the Arab Spring protest movement. A leading military council was established in his place, which then gave way to the divisive Islamist president Mohamed Morsy after elections in 2012. Morsy was later deposed by the military amid more popular protests.Following a lengthy trial, Hosni Mubarak was acquitted of killing protesters during the 18-day uprising against his autocratic rule.The two sons and their father were sentenced to three years in prison following their conviction of embezzling funds set aside for the restoration and maintenance of presidential palaces, using the money to upgrade their private residences. The sons were released in 2015 for time served, while Mubarak walked free in 2017. The trio paid back to the state the money they embezzled.The sons were briefly detained in Sep. 2018 pending their trial on charges of stock market manipulation. But they were released a bail of 100,000 pounds ($5,600) each after an appeals court accepted a motion moved by their defense lawyers to remove the judge who ordered their detention, and in 2020 they were acquitted. More

The “eye-watering” amount of taxpayers’ money lost to fraudsters who exploited Covid support schemes could be even higher than previously feared, MPs have warned.The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has estimated that £4.9bn has been lost from loans issued to ineligible businesses during the pandemic.But the Public Accounts Committee said the total sum squandered “could go even higher” because of unknown amounts lost to fraud and error from grant funding given to businesses via local authorities.Labour MP Meg Hillier, chair of the committee, said the government had offered “an open goal to fraudsters and embezzlers and they have cashed in – adding billions and billions to taxpayer woes”.In a damning report, the committee said it was worried that attempts to recover lost money will be in vain “as the money will have been spent and the trails will have long ago gone cold”.Chancellor Rishi Sunak has denied “ignoring” Covid support scheme fraud, and has promised that the government would “do everything we can” to recover money stolen by fraudsters.MPs condemned BEIS officials over the billions lost to error and fraudsters from Covid loans – saying they “did not sufficiently identify or reflect the potential risks from organised economic crime”.Suitcases filled with cash from the Covid loans were seized at the border as suspected embezzlers attempted to smuggle them out of the country, The Times reported last month.The committee also found that the department distributed £21.8bn of Covid grant funding to businesses through local authorities, but still “lacks information on recipients” of this money.BEIS officials have only estimated the level of fraud and error in under half of these grants – but already expects over £1bn of that to be lost.MPs called on the government to set out exactly how it will work with councils across the UK to calculate “robust” fraud and error estimates – and do more to recover the squandered money.The cross-party committee said it was “unconvinced” that the department’s current plans for recovering swindled money will act as a “sufficient deterrent” to those considering committing fraud.Ms Hillier said: “BEIS says it saw this risk coming, but it’s really not clear where government was looking when it set up its initial Covid response.”The senior Labour MP added: “These mistakes must be written out of future crisis responses, now, and government would do well to apply the learnings to the mounting, interrelated crises it now faces in climate change, energy supply and the cost-of-living.”Lord Agnew quit as the government’s efficiency tsar over the handling of fraudulent Covid loans in January. He accused officials of making “schoolboy errors” by handing out money to over 1,000 companies not trading at the start of the pandemic.A government spokesperson said: “We’re continuing to crack down on Covid support scheme fraud and will not tolerate those who seek to defraud consumers and taxpayers.“These schemes were implemented at unprecedented speed to protect millions of jobs and businesses. If the government didn’t move quickly, more businesses would have failed and many more jobs lost.” More

Brexit has increased the risk of dangerous foods reaching the UK because inspectors are shut out of the EU’s “rapid alert system”, ministers are warned today.The Food Standards Agency is still scrambling to build defences to compensate for the loss of data, the National Audit Office has found – a task made more difficult by the UK scrapping planned import checks.The regulator has admitted it needs a 65 per cent boost to its resources to “deliver the same result achieved with the EU’s system”, the report warns.In common with other regulators, Brexit has had a “negative impact on their ability to assess risks or carry out their work”, the NAO concludes.“Failures in food safety can have catastrophic consequences for human life, public confidence, the wider economy and international trade,” the watchdog points out.The chair of the Commons Public Accounts Committee highlighted the big gap between “high-minded talk of new Brexit freedoms and what it means in practice for regulation”.“Government must clearly light the way to prevent regulators fumbling around in the dark,” Meg Hillier said.Until the UK left the EU, it was part of the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF), allowing it to exchange information about food safety incidents and responses across the bloc.The FSA is forced to mitigate for the information loss “using other international systems, publicly available data, or by setting up data sharing arrangements on a case-by-case basis”.However, these are at “an early stage” and “there is a risk that it may have less information about food fraud risks”, the body told the inquiry.The problem mirrors the loss of instant alerts about suspected terrorists and organised criminals.Full controls on imports from the EU were seen as part of the post-Brexit defences, but the government has abandoned them over fears of adding to the cost of living crisis.Vets have warned the move is opening the door to diseases such as African Swine Fever and “wreak havoc” on disease prevention.The UK and EU intended to begin talks on “voluntary regulatory cooperation, such as exchange of information on good regulatory practices”.However, little progress has been made, due in part to the battle between the two sides over the Northern Ireland Protocol. A “regulatory cooperation committee” has met only once and will meet only once a year in future.The NAO’s warning comes following a salmonella scare which has seen more than 100 products containing cooked chicken removed from sale by a major supplier.Cranswick Country Foods said they included sandwiches and wraps sold at Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, Aldi, the Co-op, Pret a Manger and Marks & Spencer.In its evidence, the FSA said it had struck a data-sharing deal, in December 2021, with HMRC to “increase its intelligence on imports from the EU of high-risk food and feed”.“In time, it expects these new data sources to enhance its ability to identify food safety risks, but it is at an early stage in embedding their use,” the NAO stated.Gareth Davies, the head of the watchdog, said: “EU exit has had a major impact on many UK regulators.“They need to overcome many challenges if they are to manage the transition successfully, including recruiting the right specialist skills.”A spokesperson for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said: “We will ensure our regulators are fit for purpose and working as effectively as possible.” More

Labour is set to force a vote challenging Boris Johnson’s government to bring forward an emergency Budget to tackle the cost of living crisis. It comes amid mounting calls for the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, to set out further measures to alleviate the impact of the cost of rising food prices and energy bills on households, with inflation already at a 30-year high. The Bank of England has predicted inflation could soar above 10 per cent, and on Wednesday new data from the Office for National Statistics is expected to show that inflation hit 9.1 per cent in the year to April.In recent weeks, opposition parties at Westminster, trade unions and business leaders have called for an emergency Budget, with Labour’s shadow chancellor asking: “Where is the urgency and action to remedy this?”Just last week, however, cabinet minister Michael Gove dismissed the calls, saying there “won’t be an emergency Budget”, but echoed comments from the prime minister that more support may come in the coming months.Seeking to raise the issue again, Labour will table an amendment to the Queen’s Speech on Wednesday – after the inflation figures measured by the Consumer Prices Index are published. While the measure is unlikely to pass – given the prime minister’s 80-strong majority – it will be an opportunity for Labour to put ministers and Tory MPs on the spot over the issue of an emergency Budget.The party’s amendment expresses regret at the omission of an emergency Budget from the Queen’s Speech, “or to set out a new approach to the economy that will end 12 years of slow growth and high taxation under successive Conservative governments”. Ahead of a debate in the chamber, Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, said: “Our country faces a cost of living crisis and a growth crisis. Wages are being squeezed, our tax system is unfair, and there is no plan for the future of our economy.“None of this is inevitable, but a consequence of government policies and Conservative choices. Where is the urgency and the action to remedy this?”She added: “Labour has a new vision for a fairer and more prosperous economy. That’s why the Conservatives must back our motion today, not just for them to come forward with an emergency Budget to tackle the cost of living crisis, but to set out the plan Britain deserves and get our economy firing on all cylinders.” More

Rishi Sunak’s reputation has “crashed like cryptocurrency”, said senior Labour MP Ed Miliband in a stinging attack over the chancellor’s failure to provide fresh help with the cost of living crisis.The shadow climate minister condemned Mr Sunak over his refusal to impose a windfall tax on oil and gas giants, accusing him of being “in denial” and “wholly out of touch”.The criticism came as Mr Miliband’s Labour colleague, the shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves, called on the government to abolish the UK’s non-dom tax loopholes. More

A Conservative MP has been arrested on suspicion of rape and sexual assault. The Metropolitan Police said a man in his fifties was in custody over allegations that date from between 2002 and 2009. The unnamed MP has been asked by his party’s whips not to attend parliament while a police investigation is ongoing. A spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police said: “In January 2020, the Met received a report relating to alleged sexual offences having been committed between 2002 and 2009. The offences are alleged to have occurred in London. “An investigation is ongoing, led by officers from Central Specialist Crime. A man, aged in his fifties, was arrested on suspicion of indecent assault, sexual assault, rape, abuse of position of trust, and misconduct in public office. He remains in custody.” The arrest comes just weeks after Westminster was rocked by another round of “Pestminster” allegations against sitting MPs. They led to the resignation of one Tory MP, Neil Parish, after he admitted he had watched pornography in the Commons chamber. Last month, disgraced former Conservative MP Imran Ahmad Khan resigned after he was convicted of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy. His victim said that he had alerted the Conservative Party before Mr Khan was elected an MP, but his warnings had gone unheeded. There were also reports that three cabinet ministers were among 56 MPs said to have been accused of sexual misconduct and referred to parliament’s sleaze watchdog. The Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme was set up in the wake of the #MeToo movement and after a previous round of allegations against parliamentarians, during which the name “Pestminster” was coined.A Conservative Whips’ Office spokesperson said: “The chief whip has asked that the MP concerned does not attend the parliamentary estate while an investigation is ongoing. Until the conclusion of the investigation we will not be commenting further.”But Garry Graham, the deputy general secretary of the Prospect union, asked “what will it take” for MPs accused of serious offences to be formally banned from parliament. More

Boris Johnson is coming under intense pressure to publish the legal basis for plans to override the Northern Ireland protocol, as the EU raised the spectre of an all-out trade war by warning it was ready to take “all measures at its disposal” in response.Legal experts questioned foreign secretary Liz Truss’s assertion in the House of Commons that a proposed parliamentary bill, which would drive a coach and horses through the finely balanced agreement struck by Boris Johnson in 2019, is “legal in international law”.And there was unease on the Conservative benches over the potential damage to the UK’s reputation if it is seen to be breaching its international obligations.“MPs will want to see the legal advice and know it is sustainable and arguable before going ahead with this,” one former minister told The Independent. “We don’t want to be back in the same battle as we had with the Internal Market Bill, with ministers talking about breaking the law in a limited way.”The row came as the scale of disruption caused by Brexit to trade across the Irish Sea was exposed by Marks & Spencer boss Archie Norman, who said that sending a lorryload of goods to the Republic now required eight hours to be spent on paperwork in order to deal with 700 pages of documentation, some of it in Latin.Ms Truss said that the legislation – due to be published before the summer – would protect stability in Northern Ireland, not only by easing checks on goods arriving from mainland Britain, but also by removing the role of European judges and taking on new powers for Westminster on VAT and subsidies in the country.But the move would blow a hole in Northern Ireland’s special status under the Brexit deal, which uniquely allows it to enjoy the benefits of the single market.European Commission vice-president Maros Sefcovic said that any UK move to disapply elements of the protocol was “not acceptable”, warning that Brussels was ready to “respond with all measures at its disposal”.And Irish foreign affairs minister Simon Coveney said he “deeply regrets” the UK move, which he said was contrary to the wishes of people and businesses in Northern Ireland.The Conservative chair of the Commons Northern Ireland committee, Simon Hoare, confronted Ms Truss on the floor of the house, telling her: “Respect for the rule of law runs deep in our Tory veins. I find it extraordinary that a Tory government needs to be reminded of that.“Could she assure me that support for, and honouring of, the rule of law is what she and the government is committed to?”Mr Johnson claimed that the “higher duty of the UK government in international law” was to the Good Friday Agreement and the peace process, rather than to the deal he had struck with Brussels.He said that the text of the protocol made clear the need to protect trade across the Irish Sea and the integrity of the UK internal market.And he denied he wanted to scrap the agreement, saying: “Let’s fix it. We don’t want to nix it, we want to fix it, and we will work our hardest to do it.”Diplomats in Brussels said it was too early to speculate on how the EU would respond to unilateral action from the UK, though it is thought that any action is unlikely to be triggered until Ms Truss’s legislation clears parliament.But Catherine Barnard, a professor of EU law at Cambridge University, told The Independent that options would go right up to the termination of the UK’s post-Brexit zero-tariff zero-quota trade deal.Article 779 of the trade and cooperation agreement allows this “nuclear” option to be deployed with 12 months’ notice, potentially thrusting the UK into a no-deal Brexit in the run-up to the general election expected in 2024.There is no legal basis to the government’s argument that the Good Friday Agreement takes precedence over the provisions of the protocol under international law, said Prof Barnard.“The mainstream view is that this is likely to be incompatible with international law,” she said. “It will certainly be incompatible with the UK’s withdrawal agreement.”And the government’s former top lawyer Sir Jonathan Jones, who quit over the Internal Market Bill, said: “Unilateral changes which aren’t also agreed with the EU aren’t a ‘solution’ at all; certainly not any settled end state.“Instead, they can only be the beginning of a much more difficult phase in our relationship with the EU, involving (almost certainly, but let’s see the analysis) a breach of international law, undermining of trust, and the prospect of a trade war and other reprisals.”Ms Truss insisted that the UK’s preference remains a negotiated outcome with the EU, and invited Mr Sefcovic to London to discuss the way ahead. Government sources said the bill could be pulled if Brussels complies with UK demands during the course of its passage through parliament, which is expected to take several months.But former Northern Ireland secretary Peter Hain told The Independent that the House of Lords would “put up a No Entry sign” to Ms Truss’s legislation.Peers will not feel obliged to let through a bill which does not feature either in the government’s manifesto or this month’s Queen’s Speech, said Lord Hain.“It looks more like playing politics than serious negotiation,” he said. “There will be a lot of senior judicial figures now in the Lords, as well as former secretaries of state for Northern Ireland, who will not like this, and I think we can expect significant cross-party opposition.”Conservative former deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine told The Independent the move was “the worst manifestation to date of the deceptions of Brexit”.“This is entirely Boris’s fault,” said Lord Heseltine. “He made promises that he was warned would not be deliverable, and he is now going to breach international law, and that is not something a British prime minister should do. It threatens Britain’s reputation as a law-abiding society.” More

Boris Johnson has said he does not share the economic pessimism expressed by Bank of England governor, who admitted to feeling “helpless” amid the worsening cost of living crisis.Andrew Bailey warned on Monday of an “apocalyptic” spike in food prices, predicted unemployment will rise, and conceded that the Bank is largely “helpless” to address inflation.Asked on Tuesday if too he felt “helpless” over living costs, the prime minister said: “No – I think that this country has got a fantastic future.”Mr Johnson told reporters: “What we’ve got to do is fix some short-term global inflation issues caused by coming out of the pandemic – particularly on supply chains, particularly on the cost of energy. But we have the fixes.”In a sign of the tension between the government and the governor, cabinet minister Brandon Lewis said he was “surprised” by the language Mr Bailey used to describe the cost of living crisis.Mr Johnson’s official spokesperson declined to comment on Mr Bailey’s remarks, telling reporters: “It’s for him to justify the words he uses.”However, senior government source made clear that the governor’s decision to use such strong language in a public hearing was not regarded as helpful in No 10.“I think you need to be cautious about your language when you’re talking about that sort of stuff if you’re in the Bank of England,” said the source.On the governor’s comments about employers’ being justified to continue with pay restraint, the source added: “I think he was trying to stick to a macro-economic point that he was trying to make, but obviously it’s the forum where you are making it. That’s not where I would do it.”Asked about Mr Bailey’s “apocalyptic” warning on food prices, the Northern Ireland secretary Mr Lewis told the BBC: “I was surprised to see that particular turn of phrase, I have to say.”Mr Lewis’ criticism follows a Sunday Telegraph article which quoted unnamed ministers attacking the Bank and suggesting its independence was being questioned within government.UK is facing a ‘bad situation’ with soaring inflation says Bank of England GovernorHowever, chancellor Rishi Sunak has indicated his support for continued Bank of England independence, telling MPs “whilst we do face challenges at the moment, the record of 25 years of central bank independence speaks for itself”.His comments came as the Tory chair of the Treasury Committee Mel Stride called on Mr Sunak to give a “categoric assurance to the House that there are no plans of any kind to restrain the independence” of the Bank.The Office for National statistics recorded inflation at 7 per cent in March, but the Bank of England has said inflation is likely to peak at 10.25 per cent during the final quarter of 2022.It comes as the chairman of Marks & Spencer warned that food prices could soar by as much as 10% this year. “It’s very negative for consumer discretionary income but it’s perhaps not apocalyptic,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. More