In a week where the UK government has become embroiled in an increasingly damaging sleaze scandal, Number 10 could have done without today’s headlines concerning the former attorney general and Tory MP, Geoffrey Cox.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, a senior Whitehall source accused Cox, who is representing the British Virgin Islands (BVI) government in an inquiry launched by the UK Foreign Office earlier this year, of “pocketing hundreds of thousands of pounds to help stop the exposure of corruption”. The inquiry has heard BVI officials accused of spending public money without checks, as well as more serious charges of being connected to drug running, leasing public land and granting jobs to friends.
On those specific charges, a friend of the BVI might argue that the Overseas Territory’s government has a right to legal advice, considering the serious nature of the allegations against it. Besides, how is the UK government in any position to criticise anyone about cronyism given its own role in COVID-related contracts?
