UK: Conservatives and Brexit Party received donations worth £8m from aviation industry

The Brexit Party, the Conservative Party and their MPs have received donations worth GBP8m from the aviation industry, according to new analysis. The boss of a jet fuel company who regularly donated to the Tories over a decade has given the Brexit Party GBP5.2m in the past six months, figures show. Extinction Rebellion climate campaigners said the donations showed that politicians could not be “trusted to protect the planet while they’re taking money from the biggest polluters”. Figures dating back over the past 18 years show that the Conservatives have accepted GBP2.8m from businesses and individuals linked to airlines. Political parties and individual politicians have received gifts worth more than GBP9m in total, the analysis by DeSmog found. Airports, airlines and aircraft manufacturers have made hundreds of contributions, either in cash or to cover MPs’ travel and airport parking costs, since the Electoral Commission’s online political finance database listings begin in 2001. Of parliamentary candidates who were MPs when the election was called, Liam Fox, former trade secretary, received the most, the figures showed, with GBP19,000 worth of gifts from Virgin Atlantic and BAA. Dr Fox, who has previously voted against measures to limit damaging carbon emissions, earlier this year said the government would continue to support the fossil fuel industry. However, most donations to single MPs were made in 2001, and are understood to have been in the form of free airport parking, which ended that year.<br/>