David Cameron so stinkingly Tory earned about $10 million from finance firm Greensill
Capital before the company’s collapse, according to documents leaked to
the BBC.
The former British prime minister was due to be paid $4.5 million
after tax for a tranche of Greensill shares, according to a letter from
the firm to Cameron obtained by the BBC Panorama program.
Cameron also received a salary of $1 million a year as a part-time
adviser and was paid a bonus of $700,000 in 2019, the broadcaster
reported. In total, the program alleges the documents suggest he made
around $10 million before tax for two-and-a-half years’ part-time work.
The
number, reported, is news, not least because Cameron himself
had refused to disclose it. Speaking to a Commons committee
investigating his failed lobbying for the failed company, the failed
former PM would say only that he had been paid a 'generous' sum by
Greensill.That one word, 'generous', speaks volumes about Cameron
and the Greensill episode. Cameron lets not forget is nothing but a
slave owning descendent who has not worked a single day of his life, who
with a reported obscene £30 million in inherited wealth, whilst PM
imposed austerity on the rest of us.
The former Conservative leader has been at the center of Britain’s biggest lobbying scandal
in a generation after it emerged he pressed senior ministers and
officials to include Greensill Capital in a coronavirus lending scheme.
Greensill which provided loans to steel magnate Sanjeev Gupta's company -
cratered in March after a furious lobbying effort for Covid cash by Mr
Cameron fell flat.
The former premier bombarded ministers including Rishi Sunak and
senior officials with 56 texts begging for Government bailout loans.
During a Commons grilling in May Mr Cameron bragged he made "far
more" cash at Greensill than he did in No10 but refused to cough an
exact figure.
Following Greensill’s collapse in March, which left 3,000 jobs at a
steel manufacturer at risk, investigations have been opened into the
company’s activities in the U.K., Germany and elsewhere. The former
prime minister was cleared of breaking lobbying rules but a cross-party
group of MPs found he had demonstrated a “significant lack of
judgment.” He also faced questions for bringing Australian financier Lex
Greensill into the heart of Government as an adviser with a desk in
Downing Street.
Senior civil servant Sir Bill Crothers was also found to have parachuted into a plum Greensill job after leaving Whitehall.
In a statement released after the new allegations emerged on Monday
evening, Mr Cameron's spokesperson said the former Conservative party
leader committed "no wrongdoing".
"David Cameron deeply regrets
that Greensill went into administration and is desperately sorry for
those who have lost their jobs," the spokesperson said.
"As he was
neither a director of the company, nor involved in any lending
decisions, he has no special insight into what ultimately happened.
"He
acted in good faith at all times, and there was no wrongdoing in any of
the actions he took. He made the representations he did to the UK
government not just because he thought it would benefit the company, but
because he sincerely believed there would be a material benefit for UK
businesses at a challenging time.
"He had no idea until December 2020 that the company was in danger of failure.
"We
are not commenting on David Cameron's remuneration; this is a private
matter. But it is preposterous to suggest that he would work for any
company if he was aware that it was behaving improperly, or was in any
way seeking to mislead investors.
"Indeed, Panorama's questions
and assertions are attempting to define a role for David Cameron at
Greensill that is totally at odds with the facts. He was a part-time
adviser to the company - one of several - and had no executive or board
responsibilities whatsoever."
The statement adds that Mr Cameron
"had no knowledge" of GFG's financial situation and repeats that "both
the Treasury Select Committee and the Boardman Report have since
confirmed that he broke no rules".
Labour's deputy leader
Angela Rayner said it was "ludicrous" that the former Conservative prime
minister allegedly earned over £7m from his work with Greensill and
accused Mr Cameron of "using his Tory contacts for huge personal gain"."The
fact that David Cameron was cleared of any wrongdoing, proves that the
rules that are supposed to regulate lobbying are completely unfit for
purpose. It's created a wild west where the Conservatives think it's one
rule for them and another for everyone else,""The
system causes more harm than good by giving a veil of legitimacy to the
rampant cronyism, sleaze and dodgy lobbying that is polluting our
democracy under Boris Johnson and the Conservatives. This is
money most of us cannot even imagine, but for David Cameron it was just a
part-time gig using his Tory contacts for huge personal gain." Ms Rayner said.
.Personally I believe dodgy Dave Cameron to be a smug, conceited, greedy hypocrite of the first
order, who arrogantly negligent of the well-being of the country, runs
away from his responsibility, protects party over people, who devoid of
any principle, simply grubbed around in the trough to the tune of £10m ,who along with his friends was always on hand to castigate poor people
on benefits, who seem to think they are entitled to far more, whilst
lining their own grubby pockets. Cameron and his party clearly believe
that society should be founded on inequality, that the poor deserve
poverty, whilst the wealthy deserve incentives. Simply rotten to the
core, whatever reputation he once had, simply now lies in tatters, and as for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, well like his predecessor, is made from the same cloth.
