Revealed: the foreign governments behind Westminster's cross-party groups

Foreign states aren't meant to fund the organisations running parliamentary groups. Our investigation found evidence that some do.

By Daniel Tester, Peter Geoghegan and Lucas Amin

A cross-party group of MPs and peers focused on Britain’s use of nuclear submarines to counter the military rise of China is run by a think tank funded by the Taiwanese government, Democracy for Sale can reveal.

All Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs) are not allowed to accept secretariat services “funded directly or indirectly by a foreign government”.

But we found that the APPG dedicated to promoting the Aukus nuclear submarine pact is run by an organisation that received more than £75,000 last year from the Taipei Representative Office in the UK. Taiwan last year asked to join the UK, US and Australia in the £175 billion Aukus agreement against a backdrop of rising concerns about China’s military activity.

Our investigation also found other APPGs that are being run by firms that lobby for other foreign governments. In response to our findings, experts have called for a full investigation.

“Foreign governments are explicitly barred from funding parliamentary groups,” said Tim Picton, senior advocacy advisor at Spotlight on Corruption. “These revelations suggest that there are very significant loopholes in foreign influence rules that need to be investigated.”

The Aukus APPG includes crossbench peer John Woodcock, former security minister Tom Tugendhat and is chaired by Labour MP Michelle Scrogham. Its secretariat is provided by the Council on Geostrategy, which is also registered as a lobbyist for Taiwan’s foreign office.

The Council on Geostrategy’s lobbying work includes promoting “ways Britain can work with Taiwan” and recommending policies aimed at “making more permanent the UK’s ‘footing’ in the Indo-Pacific” to senior British political officials.

Taiwan has funded the Council since at least 2022, including more than £75,000 last year and £35,000 in 2024.

Many of the Council’s other funders last year were defence companies involved in the Aukus deal, including BAE systems, Rolls Royce Submarines and Babcock International - each of which also fund the APPG itself.

Under rules introduced in 2023 to curb foreign influence in British politics, APPGs cannot use secretariats funded by foreign governments. MPs who chair APPGs are advised to explicitly confirm that their secretariats have not received funding from foreign governments.

Tommy Sheppard, a former Scottish National Party MP who sat on the standards committee during his time in Westminster, told Democracy for Sale that the Aukus APPG’s operation appears to be a “clear breach” of parliamentary rules on foreign interference.

“I’d have thought ‘nor may it accept the services of a secretariat funded directly or indirectly by a foreign government’ is pretty clear,” he said.

A spokesperson for Michelle Scrogham said the APPG had taken advice from the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards before appointing the secretariat and had done “everything necessary” to comply with both “the letter and the spirit of the rules”.

When approached for comment, the Council on Geostrategy referred us to Scrogham’s comments and declined to add anything further.

APPGs have previously been accused of breaching foreign influence rules. The APPG on Defence Technology shut down last year after reports that it had accepted funding from a subsidiary of Israeli government-owned arms firm Rafael.

The Aukus APPG is not the only parliamentary group run by a firm registered to lobby for a foreign government that we found.

The APPG on Foreign Affairs is run by College Green Group, a consultancy firm registered as a lobbyist for both the Turkish Embassy and the Government of St Lucia.

College Green’s lobbying work includes seeking to influence “a decision of a Minister or Government department in the UK” on behalf of Turkey, according to official disclosures.

A campaign linked to College Green organised parliamentary trips to Northern Cyprus and later hosted a Commons event attended by its then president Ersin Tatar, a right-wing hardliner who supports the secession of the territory and is backed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

DUP MP Sammy Wilson later apologised in Parliament after Democracy for Sale revealed he had failed to declare an interest when asking a Commons question about Northern Cyprus following one of the trips. He is currently under investigation over a separate alleged failure to declare an interest.

Several of the MPs flown out to Northern Cyprus, including Wilson and Tory peer Baroness Mobarik, later helped found the APPG on Foreign Affairs.

College Green’s APPG work previously attracted attention when we revealed that it rebranded three of its APPGs as “policy liaison groups” in what anti-corruption campaigners told Democracy for Sale appeared to be an attempt to evade tighter rules around lobbying transparency.

The firm, which also offers paid services helping aspiring MPs run for election, is led by the former Cambridge Analytica consultant and Vote Leave data chief Thomas Borwick.

A spokesman for the Foreign Affairs APPG said that the group “conducts its work in a professional, ethical and proper manner” and that “at no stage has the APPG given any preferential treatment to any client of the secretariat.”

A spokesperson for College Green Group said that it “fully complies” with the APPG rules on foreign interference.

“We disclose all interests, including our legitimate and transparent work with governments, and would not facilitate meetings, travel or correspondence to benefit clients under the auspices of the APPG,” they said.

Duncan Hames, director of policy at Transparency International UK told us that “Parliament tightened the rules on APPGs precisely out of concern that they could offer foreign governments a backdoor into Westminster. So when the firms running these groups are also registered as lobbyists for foreign states, that should set alarm bells ringing.

“If arrangements like these are allowed, that would expose a loophole that urgently needs closing.”

Democracy for Sale is dedicated to uncovering dark money and hidden influence in our politics and fighting against secrecy.

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