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Cherie Blair Is Working for a Russian Oligarch Who Is Now Suing British and Luxemburg Governments in Corporate Court

Support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system Read our Digital / Print Editions Packed with exclusive investigations, analysis, and features SUBSCRIBE TODAY The UK is being sued by a Russian oligarch under controversial Investor State Dispute Settlement rules, the UK Government has confirmed. The same oligarch is also suing the Government of Luxembourg with the help of former Prime Minister Tony Blair's wife, Cherie Blair. She is not part of the action against the UK Government. On Tuesday November 18, Chris Bryant, Secretary of State for Business and Trade told Parliament that Mikhail Fridman, a Russian oligarch and ally of Putin is suing the British Government under an ISDS provision, following a question from Martin Rhodes, the Labour MP for Glasgow North. The rumour that an oligarch was suing the British Government under ISDS was reported in several outlets including Byline Times earlier this year, though Bryant's answer in Parliament was the first time that the rumour, and the identity of the oligarch in question was confirmed publicly. ISDS mechanisms contained in trade treaties are controversial because, according to critics, they allow corporations to override the decisions of sovereign governments by dragging states into very expensive, long running cases when multinationals or ultra-high net worth individuals feel they have lost out on potential profit. Fridman is understood to be using it to oppose sanctions placed on him following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. BREAKING Corporations Could Sue the Government Under India Deal, Campaigners Warn Campaigners warn that it risks creating a system of "corporate courts" Olly Haynes Fridman, a Russian-Israeli dual national with interests across Europe, is also suing the Government of Luxembourg over its decision to sanction him following the outbreak of the Ukraine war. He is being represented in the €13.8 billion claim against Luxembourg, which is at an early stage in the proceedings, by several firms including Cherie Blair and Omnia Strategy, the law firm she co-founded. In May Douglas Alexander, who was then Minister of State for Business and Trade, met with the Tony Blair Institute to discuss trade strategy. The lawsuit in the UK is likely to bring more attention to the Blair's activities at a time when Tony Blair is under fire for his proposed role in Trump's Gaza plan, and his lobbying of the British Government through the Tony Blair Institute. This is the second ISDS case that the UK Government is having to contend with. West Cumbria Mining is currently suing the UK Government after the proposal for a new coal mine was quashed by the high court. A major investor in West Cumbria Mining, Woodhouse Investment Pte Ltd is a Singaporean firm and is also suing the Government through a bilateral investment treaty with Singapore signed in 1975. Fridman previously attempted to appeal the sanctions placed against him by the British Government in the High Court, but the claim was dismissed in 2023. He was initially sanctioned in March 2022 under the designation that he was a "pro-Kremlin oligarch". This designation was removed in 2023, however he remained sanctioned for deriving benefit from or supporting the Government of Russia through his position as director of Alfa Group. Much of the criticism of the ISDS system relates to Western corporations overturning decisions made by poorer countries in the global South in attempts to control their own resources, though campaigners hope that Fridman's use of ISDS legislation as a way to overturn sanctions can prompt the Government into changing tack. Tom Wills, Director of the Trade Justice Movement, described the revelation of Fridman's lawsuit as "staggering" and said: "ISDS gives wealthy investors a private legal backdoor to challenge democratic decisions. Now we discover that this backdoor is being used by someone sanctioned for their links to the Russian regime". The UK is party to 79 trade a...

Alf Dubs Accuses Shabana Mahmood of 'Letting the Country Down' With Plans to Outdo Reform on Asylum

Support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system Read our Digital / Print Editions Packed with exclusive investigations, analysis, and features SUBSCRIBE TODAY When veteran Labour peer Alf Dubs first heard the Government's hardline proposals to transform the asylum system, he was shocked. Lord Dubs, who arrived in Britain as a child refugee from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia in 1939 on the Kindertransport and has since spent his life campaigning on behalf of displaced children, told Byline Times that he was "taken aback" to hear some of the proposals announced last week. "There are some very harsh and unnecessary things, which are bitterly disappointing coming from a Labour Government," he said. "They are very different to the sorts of things the party supported when we were in opposition. We cannot defeat Reform by trying to outdo them." Dubs has good reason to feel shocked. In 2020, he signed a joint letter with Keir Starmer urging the then Conservative Government to restore its commitment to family reunion for child refugees. In the letter the then Shadow Brexit Secretary said there was a "moral argument" to protect "some of the most vulnerable people in the world." Five years on and Starmer's own Government is now ripping up some of those same protections. Shabana Mahmood's Asylum Plans Will Put Human Trafficking Victims at Risk, Warn Anti-Slavery Groups Leading anti-slavery organisations have told Byline Times that the new measures could allow trafficking and forced labour to thrive Matt Gallagher Dubs says the Government's new plans, which include making refugee status temporary and making it harder for refugee families to reunite, represent a "historic low for the Labour party" that he has been a member of for the past five decades. Of particular concern for Dubs is the suggestion that families could be forced to return to their home country once ministers deem it "safe" to return. That would involve imprisoning children, including those born in this country, something the Home Secretary has declined to rule out. Lord Dubs met last week with Home Office minister Alex Norris to raise his concerns. However, he hasn't yet met the Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood. "She [Mahmood] is doing things that I think are letting this country down," he said. "I don't think [former Labour Home Secretary] David Blunkett did that. These proposals undermine basic human rights principles. We're better as a country than that." Last week Mahmood justified her plans for the asylum system by telling MPs that she and her family had been subjected to racist abuse over many years, including being called a "fucking paki". Given her experiences, Dubs finds it surprising that she has taken such a hardline stance on refugees. "I'm hoping that her feelings will hold sway over the harsher line she's putting forward. She knows what it's like" he says. Lord Dubs, who has spent his life helping lone child refugees to settle in Britain, was particularly disheartened by some of the language the Home Secretary used. In her statement on the plans, Mahmood suggested that asylum seekers were "exploiting the fact that they have children" to "thwart attempts" to remove them. The Home Secretary added that the system currently "incentivises" families to put their children on unseaworthy dinghies to cross the Channel. Responding to the comments, Lord Dubs told BBC that the Government was "using children as a weapon". His alarm was only heightened by the response from Nigel Farage's Reform UK to Mahmood's proposals. Reform UK MP Danny Kruger welcomed the rhetoric used by the Home Secretary, suggesting that Labour sounded like Reform, and invited Mahmood to defect to their party. Reform's official Twitter account later posted a meme of Mahmood in her bedroom with their flags behind her. This was, Lord Dubs says, "cheap politics" with the refugee issue being exploited for "cynical electoral ends." He believes Nigel Farage is riding th...

'Rachel Reeves Buys Herself Some Time With a Calculated Bet on the UK Economy'

Support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system Read our Digital / Print Editions Packed with exclusive investigations, analysis, and features SUBSCRIBE TODAY It is often the case that events of expected high political drama fail to live up to billing. For weeks, we have been told that today's Budget was a make-or-break moment for the chancellor, the Government and the economy. The speculation over what might be in it has been leading the news for months, fuelled by ridiculous - indeed disgraceful - amounts of Treasury kite-flying. Labour MPs feared manifesto-busting tax rises, the Conservatives salivated at the prospect of a Liz Truss-style market meltdown, while the City watched in horror as share and bond prices swung wildly in response to every rumour. Indeed one outraged City grandee told me that he thought Treasury ministers and officials should be charged with market abuse. Yet the reality is that the budget itself was something of a damp squib - and not just because the Office for Budget Responsibility managed to publish the entire contents half an hour before the chancellor delivered it. It turned out that the OBR really did come to Reeves's rescue with a much better fiscal forecast than anyone had expected, enabling the chancellor to duck hard choices. Higher tax revenues as a result of higher wages offset much of the impact of a downgrade to productivity forecasts to take account of the damage from Brexit and the global financial crisis. This is what enabled her to suddenly abandon a planned 2p rise in income tax just days after she had held a breakfast press conference to roll the pitch for it. In fact, the OBR reckoned that, even after previous U-turns on welfare spending cuts since last year's budget, she was still on track to meet her fiscal rules with £4 billion to spare. The Good News in Rachel Reeves' Budget From lifting hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty, to taking on the media-backed gambling lobby, there was much to praise and far less to criticise in the Chancellor's annual statement, argues Adam Bienkov Adam Bienkov That result was that Reeves was able to scrap the two-child benefit cap at a cost of £3 billion a year - as demanded by Labour MPs - while raising taxes by much less than expected tax - and still increase her headrooom under her fiscal rules to £22 billion. That is more than twice the safety margin that she left herself with after last year's budget. True, the £26 billion of tax rises that she announced are still the third highest of any budget since 2010 and will raise the tax burden to 38% of GDP, an all-time high. But the bulk of those tax rises will come in the form of freezes in personal allowance for three years after 2028. Other measures that will not kick in for several years include a new road pricing charge for electric vehicle drivers, a reduction in the tax perks for some pension savers, and higher taxes on rents and dividends to bring them in line with other forms of income. Nonetheless, backdating tax rises to pay for higher welfare today is not without risks. According to Deutsche Bank, 47% of the tax rises will not come until the last year of the current parliament. Reeves will be hoping that an expected 0.4 percentage point reduction in inflation as a result of budget measures to reduce the cost of living will enable the Bank of England to cut interest rates faster than expected, while the increased headroom will convince the bond markets to reduce the one percentage point risk premium that they currently add to gilt yields. And of course, she will be hoping that something will turn up between now and 2028 that will enable her to avoid going into the next election with one in four people paying higher rate tax. As the OBR notes, an AI-driven productivity boom could give her more than £50 billion of headroom by the election, giving her plenty of scope for pre-election giveaways. ENJOYING THIS ARTICLE? HELP US TO PRODUCE MORE ...

Budget 2025: 'Rachel Reeves Bakes an Economic Pudding With No Theme'

Support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system Read our Digital / Print Editions Packed with exclusive investigations, analysis, and features SUBSCRIBE TODAY "This pudding has no theme" was a Churchillism that could be applied to budgets as well as desserts. Because while Rachel Reeves' Budget on Wednesday was in many ways progressive it tells us little about why the Chancellor, or the Government, want to be progressive, where they are taking us, why or how. Mrs Thatcher once remarked that "It is only on the basis of truth that power should be won or indeed can be worth winning". It's a quote that comes to mind as we look at how this Government has descended, despite its huge majority, into survival mode. Running the state in the 21st century is hard, the poly-crisis of economy, environment, technology and geopolitics create untold pressures and challenges. No one should just stand on the sidelines and claim it's easy. But given the complexity and scale of these challenges and more, how on earth could it happen that a Government can come in with so little scrutiny and having done none of the deep thinking and preparation to manage these issues and more? Again, let's be considered. It is not as if everything can be solved overnight. It's not that progress on the economy or public services we're going to be easy or quick. Meaningful change takes time. We need a politics that is pragmatic in the best sense of the word - a clear sense of direction, and an openness and patience in terms of making progress. But this Government came in with nothing except an overblown sense of their own ability to make decisions on the hoof. All the country needed, they seemed to argue, was the return of 'the grown-ups' and all would be well. They would make the right sound judgements on a case-by-case basis. They would know how to tweak the system to optimise outputs. If ever governments did work like this they they don't anymore. There isn't a lever or a dial in Downing Street or the Treasury that you can simply pull or turn and make the world a better place. It's all densely complicated. And to deal with that complexity you need people on your side willing to help and to shape and enact the decisions you make. The Good News in Rachel Reeves' Budget From lifting hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty, to taking on the media-backed gambling lobby, there was much to praise and far less to criticise in the Chancellor's annual statement, argues Adam Bienkov Adam Bienkov The Institute for Government recently reported that Keir Starmer is failing to make major improvements to public services partly because he did not plan properly while in opposition. Wes Streeting in particular is singled out for his "chaotic and incoherent approach" to NHS reform. This picture is mirrored on the economy where a fund manager looked at the impact of the new Government on the bond market and concluded "There is no plan, there is no vision, and they are not going to succeed because they do not have the talent". You can't be competent, if you don't know to what purpose. A Government that has no direction and no method was always bound to fail. The Prime Minister is of course a barrister, but what works in the courts was never going to work in the country. You can't just read the brief provided by a civil servant as he might have done in his chambers - and make technical decisions accordingly. It doesn't matter how much he promises to try harder if he has no idea what good looks like and doesn't know how change happens in the 21st Century. The decision, at least for now, not to raise the overall level of income tax in the Budget is an example of this shambolic approach. First, they should never have ruled out tax rises before the last election and put such naive promises in a manifesto. The Conservatives had already won Labour the election, so they were just ensuring that either the economy would suffer if they didn't put up t...

The Good News in Rachel Reeves' Budget

Support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system Read our Digital / Print Editions Packed with exclusive investigations, analysis, and features SUBSCRIBE TODAY There was much to welcome in Rachel Reeves annual Budget on Wednesday. Her decision to scrap the two child benefit will lift an estimated 350,000 children out of poverty and finally bring an end to the cruel George Osborne era policy that punished children for the crime of simply having been born. The policy will be partly paid for by raising taxes on Britain's harmful gambling sector - something long called for by campaigners, including the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The tax on gambling will come despite heavy lobbying by the industry as well as from some of those British news organisations which have themselves heavily benefited from the misery the sector causes. Meanwhile a new mansion tax on homes worth worth over £2 million will raise an estimated £400 million for new housing and local services, while a new pay-per-mile tax on electric vehicles will ease the transition away from polluting petrol and diesel cars. Continued increases in NHS spending will help repair some of the damage caused by 14 years of neglect under the Conservatives, while an increase to the minimum wage should raise living standards for millions of young people. EXCLUSIVE Michael Gove Made Orwell Prize Judge Despite Record of Attacking Journalists and Dodging Scrutiny Critics say "Orwell would have enjoyed the irony" of the former Conservative minister's appointment Max Colbert None of this is likely to be well received by the UK's largely Conservative and increasingly Reform-supporting press. A series of botched briefings and Treasury U-turns, followed by the accidental early release of her plans by the independent Office for Budget Responsibility, will no doubt give Fleet Street cover to label the entire package as a new "Omnishambles" Budget. Even prior to her statement the Daily Mail, which celebrated Liz Truss' disastrous budget that nearly crashed the entire UK economy as a "True Tory Budget" was lambasting what it described as Reeves' "bonkers" plans to make young people slightly better off. Plans to tax multi-million pound houses and target landlords are likely to be similarly coldly received by the hugely wealthy owners of most of Britain's newspapers. Putting Off Long Term Repairs Of course this is not to say that there are not reasonable criticisms to make of Reeves' Budget. The Chancellors' deeply unwise election pledges not to raise income tax, VAT or National Insurance has instead forced her to institute a bewildering range of new tax raising measures to make up the difference. Included in these are plans to continue Conservative freezes on income tax bands, which will raise taxes for millions of Brits. The fact the Chancellor is continuing to insist that she is keeping her pledge not to raise taxes on "working people" when she has now implemented stealth raises to both income taxes and National Insurance is difficult for anyone to credibly defend. Other measures appear to be entirely conflicting with each other. Despite spending many years urging the public to invest money in their own pensions, the new tax on pension salary sacrifice schemes will push millions to do the complete opposite. The pledge to raise wages for young people will also run headlong into the accompanying stealth measure to freeze thresholds for tuition fee repayments. The broader problem with this budget is that despite the Chancellor claiming to take the long term decisions required to turn the economy and country around, most of the difficult tax raising measures announced today are being put off until after the next general election. ENJOYING THIS ARTICLE? HELP US TO PRODUCE MORE Receive the monthly Byline Times newspaper and help to support fearless, independent journalism that breaks stories, shapes the agenda and holds power to account. PAY ANNUALLY - £39.5...