Chloe Westley refused to say how much of the TPA's funding was from individual donors
The campaign manager of the Taxpayers Alliance (TPA) has refused to answer questions about the group’s funding on Sky News today.
When asked by Adam Boulton who funds the TPA, Chloe Westley said: “We have thousands of individual donors who like what we do and who support us.”
Boulton followed up by asking: “What percentage of the funds do individual donors make up?”
Westley replied: “I’m not going to give you a list of names and addresses so they can be doxed online.”
Boulton said that was not what he was asking for and said “where is the bulk of the money coming from? It’s not individual donors is it?”
Westley replied that she had already answered the question and then went back to the previous subject they were discussing before, the European Union.T
The TPA describes itself as a think tank but a former employee Shahmir Sanni describes it as “a lobbying group pursuing a right-wing ideology”.
It is one of nine right-wing lobby groups linked to a single address in London’s Tufton Street.
It does not disclose its income or any of its funders. According to the Guardian though, it has received £223,000 from US donors in the last five years.
This includes US$100,000 originating from a billionaire-founded religious trust incorporated in the Bahamas.
One of the TPA’s current campaigns is againt clean air measures in cities like Southampton, Bath and London.
Joe Lo is a reporter for Left Foot Forward
8 Responses to “Watch: Taxpayers Alliance dodges questions on its funding”
Patrick Newman
It’s very simple. Where there is evidence of significant secret funding the networks should not give them air time. On the BBC the Institute of Economic Affairs and to a lesser extent, the Adam Smith Institute get a lot of exposure and are often introduced in a similar fashion to a genuine body like the Institute of Fiscal Studies. LFF followers should always complain when these sinister organisations are given exposure.
clive Baulch
The solution surely is simple. Don’t give these muppets any media exposure whatsoever unless they first tell us who does fund their work. And that means all their corporate donors as well as their many individual donors.
Shame on the BBC and other media outlets who keep on putting TPA on the media without giving them any ‘awkward’ questions to answer.
Andrew Carey
Shame on the BBC – this is an organisation that believes you should not have any representation for your taxation. That’s right. They believe that the Board of Trustees should not be elected by the licence fee payer, and moreover that if you disagree with that and still want to watch any television at all, that you should be taken to court.
But it is worse than that, for the Board of Trustees is appointed by the government, and the Trustees approve the top appointments within the BBC. So we have education, information and entertainment coming from the BBC which claims to be independent from both advertising and government which is in fact only independent of advertising. Every employee has been appointed by someone who has been appointed by someone who has been appointed by government. It’s a State broadcaster in denial.
The only thing the Tax Payers Alliance declines to disclose is the identities of its funders. It’s open about being a small government free market think tank. The BBC is in denial of its own independence from government and accountability to licence payers.
Patrick Newman
Mr Carey – “The only thing the Tax Payers Alliance declines to disclose is the identities of its funders.” This is a joke? That is the whole point of the article! BBC reform – yes but dont confuse it with the likes of Fox and the Daily Mail and the refusal of newspapers to be subject to independent scrutiny and challenge.
Shahmir Sanni
They try and say ‘but what about Oxfam and the CBI, but they are the Good Guys so we don’t need to wory about their funding!