Arise, Sir Remain!
Knighthoods for millionaire pro-EU donors – controversial oil chief and boss who lent Dave his private jet 20 times
THE two millionaire donors said to be in line for knighthoods have together given around £3million to the failed Remain campaign and the Tory party.
Ian Taylor, one of the most powerful figures in the international oil industry, is being recommended for a knighthood by David Cameron in his resignation honours list, it emerged yesterday.
And Andrew Cook, 66, chairman of engineering firm William Cook, who has lent the former prime minister his private plane more than 20 times, is also in line for a similar award.
Taylor’s proposed honour has infuriated Eurosceptic MPs because it is being seen as part of his reward for helping bankroll the Remain campaign.
Oxford-educated Taylor, 60, is the chief executive and president of Vitol Oil, whose head office is in the tax haven of Switzerland.
Vitol, which he joined from Shell in 1985, has been plagued by controversies – including over its operations in Iraq, Libya, and Serbia, and over its own tax affairs.
The proposed knighthood for Taylor, who is worth £175million, is not the only one for a financial supporter of the Remain campaign.
In fact, Taylor and Cook are both thought to have given more than a million pounds to the Tories.
They also donated heavily to Britain Stronger in Europe and other pro-EU groups: it is estimated Cook gave £250,000 and Taylor more than £300,000.
London-based Mr Taylor has a family home north of the Border and during the independence referendum he was pro-Union campaign Better Together’s biggest donor, giving around £634,770.
He is also the major shareholder in Harris Tweed and was instrumental in saving the company from bankruptcy in 2005 by dipping into his fortune to rescue it.
The pair’s proposed honours were described yesterday by Andrew Rosindell, the Tory MP for Romford, as a ‘slap in the face’.
It was when Cameron became party leader in 2005 that Taylor began giving money to the Tories. He admired Cameron’s strong support for the EU.
Ironically, Taylor’s Vitol Oil company has side-stepped EU rules because, as it is based in Switzerland, it is beyond the reach of the Brussels bureaucrats.
Under Taylor’s leadership, Vitol has become one of the biggest trading companies on the planet. It is the ninth largest corporation in the world by revenue, with an annual turnover of close to £300billion. In 2014, it made a profit of £1billion.
Despite its size and reach, very little is known about Vitol, fuelling accusations of secrecy, reports of dodgy deals with corrupt regimes, and criticism of its tax affairs.
What is known is that in 2007, Vitol pleaded guilty to grand larceny in a New York court for giving kickbacks – extra payments – to Iraq’s national oil company during Saddam Hussein’s regime to win favour. The company paid $17.5million in restitution. In 2011, Vitol was named as a key backer of the Libyan revolution after it sent tankers loaded with diesel to rebel-held ports.
That was a revolution, of course, also supported by Mr Cameron through the deployment of RAF fighter jets. These supplies of fuel proved vital to rebel efforts to overthrow Colonel Gaddafi.
In 2012, it was revealed that the firm had ignored EU sanctions protaxes. hibiting the trading of Iranian oil. Yet again, it was taking advantage of not being based in the bloc. Two years ago, Cameron was challenged in the Commons to return the Tory donations from Taylor after it emerged that Vitol had paid $1million to the notorious Serbian war criminal Arkan in the Nineties.
And at the end of 2012, it emerged that Vitol Oil were in talks with HMRC, which had issued a demand for millions of pounds in unpaid For a decade, the company had been using ‘Employee Benefit trusts’, which avoided tax on the income of its UK staff.
A senior Tory said: ‘To say Vitol Oil is a controversial company is an understatement. Taylor has always been an ardent pro-European, and has been given his reward.’
As for Cook, he boasts of being one of the richest men in Yorkshire, where his family steel firm William Cook is based. He is worth £80million, and became firm friends with David Cameron long before he was at No10, flying him all over the country in his private plane.
Cook was at the centre of Cameron’s first sleaze row as Prime Minister, when secret Whitehall documents showed he had successfully lobbied for the cancellation of an £80million government loan to a leading engineering firm.
Downing Street denied ministers had acted improperly when the loan to Sheffield Forgemasters was cancelled three weeks after Cook warned the Government it could be illegal. In a confidential email to business minister Mark Prisk, the legality of the loan under EU rules was raised by Cook, whose role in the matter was then questioned in the Commons by two Labour MPs. The email to Prisk from Cook began: ‘I am the largest donor to the Conservative Party in Yorkshire and have been ever since David Cameron became leader.’
Labour MPs said the loan affair ‘stank to high heaven’.
Cook’s firm makes equipment for high-speed rail travel. It is likely to be a major beneficiary if the Government presses ahead with the HS2 high speed rail link.
In the past, he has boasted about how he’s helped shape Tory policy.
Before the 2010 election, Cook paid for an independent policy paper on energy which called for carbon capture and storage, an expansion of tidal power, and reform of the climate change levy. All three were later contained in a Tory policy document.
He was unrepentant when his involvement in Tory policy came to light. ‘I am a wealthy man and I support David Cameron and the Conservative Party. This is why I
‘This is why I give them money’ Millions of pounds in unpaid taxes
give them money and lend him my plane to travel around the country.’
His home is a manor house in Froggatt Edge, Derbyshire, where he is registered to vote. In 2005, he declared his address had changed to the tax haven of Guernsey. He also placed shares in the firm into Jersey and UK trusts.
When challenged about the offshore move, he said: ‘I have never resided [in Guernsey] for a sufficient length of time to establish normal tax residency [there], nor have I sought to. I have always remained principally resident in the UK for tax purposes.’
Cook endeared himself to Cameron after the referendum defeat.
In an interview in his local newspaper he declared that Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, the former Justice Secretary, who were both architects of the Leave campaign, were ‘not fit’ to be prime minister.
As one Tory MP said acidly last night: ‘If there was any doubt of a gong for Cook, that will have sealed it.’