Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Fury at DUP ‘dodgy deal’
Labour slams political donations Bill
A MOVE which will keep the source of a £435,000 donation to the DUP secret has been slammed as a “dodgy deal”.
Secretary of State James Brokenshire put a Bill covering Northern Ireland’s political donors before a Westminster committee yesterday.
It was originally planned to reveal sums of more than £7,500 since January 1, 2014.
But the date was changed to July 1 this year in Mr Brokenshire’s parliamentary order – and the delegated legislation committee voted to pass it.
On Twitter, Shadow Northern Ireland Secretary Owen Smith described the order as “the fruits of another dodgy deal between the Government and the DUP”.
And he accused the Tories of “blocking transparency rules that would reveal the source of the dark money behind Brexit”. The Labour MP said: “It is essentially about the date of commencement.
“The question is why the Government chose not to do anything between 2014 and 2017? The reason is one particular donation of £425,000 – the biggest donation in the history of Northern Ireland politics – to the Democratic Unionist Party.”
The DUP was given the money by a secretive organisation called the Constitutional Research Group, which was fined £6,000 by the Electoral Commission over the cash. A large slice of the donation was spent on a pro-brexit Metro campaign not printed in Northern Ireland.
The DUP and Northern Ireland Office failed to respond to requests for a comment on the Brexit donation.