Question marks over David Cameron’s donors

From the Mail on Sunday comes news of problems for David Cameron and the Conservative Party over their fundraising:

David Cameron faced embarrassment on the eve of his party conference last night after members of a secretive club of Tory donors were linked to the ‘short-selling’ of the collapsing Bradford & Bingley.

As the bank was taken into the hands of the authorities ahead of its break-up or nationalisation, two members of Mr Cameron’s elite Leaders Group were revealed to have bet on its falling share price, which has dropped by 95 per cent in a year.

A hedge fund managed by Michael Hintze, who has given £660,000 to the Tories since Mr Cameron took over, declared ‘bets’ on the bank’s falling share price in July.

A second fund, GLG Partners, which declared its ‘short-selling’ in Bradford & Bingley in June, is managed by Belgian Pierre Lagrange, whose wife Catherine has given £50,000 to the Conservative Party…

Last year Mr Cameron apologised ‘unreservedly’ after The Mail on Sunday disclosed that he had been using his taxpayer-funded Commons office to stage lunches for the Leaders Group.

The Committee on Standards and Privileges criticised Mr Cameron for ‘abusing’ Westminster facilities.

Members of the group are promised that they will be ‘kept close to policy developments and meet with the Leader several times a year at small dinners or lunches’.

Its activities are shrouded in secrecy. Its existence was not even acknowledged on the party’s website until Friday after Channel 4 and this newspaper made enquiries about its membership…

Last night Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, whose request to Mr Cameron for details of all meetings held by the group since April 2007 was refused, said: ‘It seems that Mr Cameron’s commitment to freedom of information stops as soon as it concerns his own financial activities.’