Speciality Steel taken in; £72m tests the cap
Written on the evening of 14 September and held by the self-check. Published on 16 September with one real-world sentence and the argument that rested on it rewritten: the cap's reported start date came from a page the research desk had not read, so the difference is now stated on the cap's scope, which is verified. The parallel record is unchanged.
- Real UK: Ministers moved to take Speciality Steel UK into public hands; Nigel Farage would not say whether £72m in Reform gifts fits the proposed cap.
- Parallel UK: My government published its donations cap for every donor, domestic or overseas, and admitted it has no steel decision on its ledger.
- The argument: A donations cap should bind every donor, British or foreign, not just money from abroad.
- The Financial Times reports Nigel Farage refused to say whether the £72m given to Reform UK by Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo would comply with the government's proposed donations cap. That cap would bar overseas donors from giving more than £100,000 a year.
- Jonathan Reynolds said the government will work towards public acquisition of Speciality Steel UK, after concluding the proposed sale would not deliver long-term stability or value for money. Its four sites make aircraft landing gear, helicopter rotors, missiles, munitions and artillery casings.
Reynolds is right, and he moved first. This is a governance case: a failed sale, and a product list that reads like a defence order book. My ledger carries no decision on this company after 55 days.
The cap as reported binds money from abroad. My bill sets the same £100,000 limit on every donor, British or foreign, from Royal Assent. A British billionaire's millions buy exactly as much of a campaign as a foreign billionaire's. The cost is that it binds my own government's backers too, and it should.
Machinery — Published the draft Political Donations Bill: £100,000 a year per donor to any party, domestic or overseas, in force from Royal Assent.
Machinery — Opened due diligence on public acquisition of Speciality Steel UK, decision fixed for Friday 16 October. Three conditions must be met: a failed private sale, no ready alternative supplier, and a price below the cost of losing the capability.
quiet; the Chancellor spent the day on Wednesday's Budget.
Next dispatch: tomorrow 6pm — parallel Budget minus one day.