Former Tory prime minister David Cameron. Photo: PA
High-profile figures have expressed their fury after an investigation revealed former Tory prime minister David Cameron made £7 million from Greensill Capital before the company collapsed.
Cameron had tried to convince the government to invest taxpayers’ money in the finance firm’s loans, but the company went into administration in March.
But he is still made a total of around $10 million before tax for two and a half years of part-time work, BBC Panorama has revealed.
It comes after Cameron consistently refused to say how much he was being paid by Greensill – instead, he only ever admitted it was “far more” than his prime minister salary.
Labour MP Jess Phillips referenced the austerity brought onto the British public by Cameron in the light of the eye-watering profits revelations.
“Obscene in any case, in light of failure it’s a bloody heist,” she said.
She added: “He took away all our local advice services, thousands of local police officers, he reduced funding for refuges, took away access to justice, he made a killing from his failures, we had to suffer because of them.”
Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner also reacted to the news: “$10 million for part-time dodgy lobbying for a company that collapsed, risking thousands of pounds of taxpayers money? An absolute joke that this can ever be allowed to happen.
“The Tories take care of themselves and themselves only.”
Gary Neville declared himself as “not surprised at all.” “Wait till this lot that are in now are finished! We’re being robbed in cold daylight,” he said.
And Labour MP Dawn Butler urged people to not forget that Cameron wanted to “pump public money” into the now-defunct Greensill.
Former Tory MEP and Brexiteer David Bannerman also reacted to the news, saying revelations are “not pretty”.
And Plaid Cymru leader Liz Saville-Roberts questioned what Cameron did to deserve the huge sum for the part-time work.
“He lobbied fellow Tories in the government,” she concluded, adding: “The Westminster Tory elite are laughing all the way to the bank while the rest of us suffer the consequences.”
Cameron’s spokesperson said: “He acted in good faith at all times and there was no wrongdoing in any of the actions he took.”
But earlier this year, it emerged the permanent secretary at the Treasury, Sir Tom Scholar, was unable to publish text exchanges with Cameron because he allegedly had to have his phone reset.
The error was revealed in response to a Freedom of Information request filed by Bloomberg.
In one of Cameron’s messages to Sir Tom on 6 March, the former PM seemed to predict a Bank of England interest rate cut five days before it was announced.
Officials are legally barred from disclosing market sensitive information about changes to interest rates.
But Mr Cameron insisted it had been an autocorrect error and he was referring to a VAT cut.
Related: David Cameron texts deleted by top civil servant after ‘wrong password’ entered
