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UK Environmental Groups Given £6.7 Million of Taxpayers’ Money to Lobby Government
The Taxpayers’ Alliance have published a new report entitled ‘Taxpayer funded lobbying and political campaigning,‘ which exposes a “tip of the iceberg” £38 million of taxpayers’ money given to groups that support government policy. Information was obtained using the Freedom of Information Act and was inspired by the FakeCharities.org website.
For the year 2007 to 2008, The Campaign for Better Transport (CfBT) received over £417,000; Living Streets £150,000; Friends of the Earth £153,000 and The Green Alliance, which is heavily represented on the government appointed ‘Committee on Climate Change,’ received £137,000. Taxpayer funding for so-called ‘Environmental’ groups totalled £6,701,516. The report also commended Greenpeace for not accepting funding from governments or political parties. The CfBT, which also receives about one-fifth of its funding from bus and train companies, is alleged to have engaged in ‘partisan politics.’
The report concludes that “It cannot be acceptable for the political debate to be so massively skewed in favour of the ideological priorities and personal interests of those already wielding bureaucratic or political power.”
CRN comment:
The TPA report goes a long way towards explaining why the debates on the issues of road transport and climate policy are so one-sided. Democracy is being bypassed in order to further agendas that wouldn’t survive objective scrutiny or a proper democratic process. The use of taxpayers’ money to fund political viewpoints that they may seriously not agree with is a national scandal that needs to be urgently addressed.