Rishi Sunak takes much more in money from Tory donor in Diane Abbott racism storm
Rishi Sunak has already accepted much more in money from the Tory donor alleged to have made racist feedback about Diane Abbott.
Frank Hester was already the get together’s largest donor after the get together declared £10million in donations from him.
But the Electoral Commission has solely reported donations accepted as much as the top of 2023. But Mr Hester has donated extra cash to the Tories since January – reportedly round £5million, a determine the Tories didn’t deny.
The £15million complete equates to 40% of the brand new £35million spending restrict for a common election – and is nearly as a lot because the get together spent on your entire 2019 election marketing campaign.
Mr Sunak finally declared Mr Hester’s feedback “racist and wrong”, after 24 hours of dithering. But he wouldn’t rule out taking much more money from Mr Hester, and refused to decide to paying it again.
Today, a Conservative Party spokesman mentioned: “Declarable donations will be published in the usual way by the Electoral Commission.”
The Prime Minister has been under mounting pressure to pay back the £10million in donations the party has accepted from the millionaire healthcare tech tycoon.
In a meeting in 2019, Mr Hester said seeing Ms Abbott on TV made him “need to hate all Black ladies” and that she should be “shot”, according to the Guardian. He apologised for being rude but denied his comments had anything to do with her race or her gender.
At PMQs, Mr Sunak mentioned: “The gentleman apologised genuinely for his comments and that remorse should be accepted.”
The Scottish Conservatives yesterday urged the UK party to “carefully review” Mr Hester’s donations. A spokesperson mentioned: “These comments were racist and wrong. The Scottish Conservative Party has never accepted a donation from Frank Hester and the UK Conservative Party should carefully review the donations it has received from Hester in response to his remarks.”
Labour ’s Chair Anneliese Dodds mentioned: “Rishi Sunak must extract himself from this quagmire and present that he’s keen to face as much as racism inside his get together. He should pay again the cash in full, reduce ties with Mr Hester and apologise unequivocally to Diane Abbott.”
Lib Dem Chief Whip Wendy Chamberlain said: “The Conservative Party should urgently verify whether or not these experiences are true and if that’s the case hand this tainted a refund.
“The Conservative Party has dragged its feet in condemning these racist remarks for what they are. If that was in any way linked to this £5 million donation it would show this scandal is even worse than we thought.
“People like Hester and his attitudes must be nowhere close to our politics. Conservative politicians must be taught that simply because somebody offers you hundreds of thousands of kilos that doesn’t make the inexcusable, excusable.”
