WESTMINSTER (Labour Buzz) - The UK has refused to investigate Russian meddling in UK democracy for the very simple reason that they didn’t want to find any evidence. That’s the damning conclusion of the long-awaited report into Russian interference which also finds the Kremlin using a network of ‘defacto’ agents in the UK including leading figures of the UK Government.
Ever since Dr. Julian Lewis beat Chris ‘failing’ Grayling to the heads of the Intelligence committee the Government has been frantically preparing themselves for the publication of the much-delayed report into Russian interference. We’ve had Dominic Raab claiming Russia was actually helping Labour and we’ve had Number 10 make a series of statements (falsely) designed to undermine the report.
Now we know what they were afraid of.
Right from the beginning, we knew that this report was not going to pull any punches as they effectively accused the Government of lying. According to the Justice and Security Act, they said, the report had been sent to the Prime Minister for confirmation that it could be published. However, this did not come within the 10 working days that is standard, which meant the house rose for the election without the report published.
The Government had made several claims about why it was delayed including that it had only had six days to look at it; that proper procedures had not been followed and they needed to get responses from people mentioned in the report. Each of these, say the authors, are not true.
It’s an approach that clearly frustrated the report’s authors. Rather than engage with a crucial report about the integrity of our democracy they had sought to discredit it and had made palpably false statements about why they had delayed its publication.
A cynic might ask: what did they have to hide?
No questions asked
As it turned out, the report found, the answer to that question is quite a lot. Russia said the report, saw the UK as a top target and that the Scottish Referendum was mired in Russian meddling. As for the European Referendum, they could find no evidence for one very simple reason: nobody had gone looking for it.
The Government has claimed repeatedly that it has not found any evidence about interference. As it turns out what they meant was, no evidence had dropped on their heads from out of the blue while they were wandering around parliament.
No effort was made to investigate despite clear evidence of a threat. Labour’s Kevan Jones was particularly scathing. “Short of having a billboard outside number 10 saying this is what happened,” he said, “what more did the Government need?”
While the USA commissioned a report into interference within a few months of the election and published a redacted summary, the UK, has not done anything. In other words, we’ve been less transparent about Russia than Donald Trump.
From Russia with love
Much of what we might have assumed will be the most explosive evidence in this report is redacted for security reasons but we do get a gist of what it includes. The report outlines a network of dirty money from Russia used to influence British democracy. It shows Russian Oligarchs who have obtained their money illegally, using that money to influence politicians and members of the establishment.
Members of the House of Commons and House of Lords had relationships with Russian officials and businessmen which needed to be brought under scrutiny. The published version of the report doesn’t name names, but it also pulls no punches with the undeniable conclusion that illegal Russian money is being used to meddle with British politics.
The anti-corruption campaigner Bill Browder who gave evidence to the committee did name names. Speaking on LBC radio, he said he gave the committee the names of businessmen, politicians and British establishment leaders, how much money was exchanged, and what they were hoping to achieve.
At the very least, this report should have us looking again at individuals such as Arron Banks. Although he would deny any wrongdoing we still don’t know anything about the origin of his multi-million-pound donation to the Leave Campaign.
It’s also fair to examine Boris Johnson’s close relationships with Russian Oligarchs who pay thousands of pounds to play tennis with him. Why, for example, was his first party after the election at a former KGB agent’s birthday party.
There are of course no outright suggestions that the Prime Minister himself has anything to hide other than remarking again how odd it is that his first port of call after his election victory was to a Russian Oligarch’s house at a time when he has a report on his desk warning him that Russian Oligarchs are using their ill-gotten gains to influence key political figures.
At the very least, this report shows the Government was asleep at the wheel. There was smoke for everyone to see, the report says, but for reasons we don’t yet know, the Government turned down every opportunity to see if there was a fire. The only reasonable explanation is that they were terrified by what they might find.
If the report’s authors were hoping its publication will prompt the Government into action, they were to be disappointed. Even before the press conference had wrapped up, Number 10 was refuting the need for an investigation. On Russian meddling, they say, their stance remains as it ever has been: ‘hear no evil, see no evil’.
(Written by Tom Cropper, Edited by Klaudia Fior)