Muslim takeover of New Labour and the UK media

We all know that the morons of the Far Left UAF and the Stormfront Nazis are allied together in their hatred of Jews and Israel, but it now appears that their obsession with Zionism has blinded them to the gradual corporate theft and takeover of or democracy by Arab oil money.

Example 1 - Arab owned TV channel pimps Respect party candidates in elections ;

Islam Channel fined £30k by Ofcom over conduct
31st July, 2007


The Islam Channel has been fined £30,000 by media regulator Ofcom, it announced today, for "serious breaches" of the Brodcasting Code applicable to all television stations.

The regulator criticised the channel on several counts, most notably for allowing political candidates to use to promote their candidacy in forthcoming elections.

Ofcom's rules state that candidates in elections "must not act as news presenters, interviewers or presenters of any type of programme during the election period". However it found this code was breached by two candidates several times over a period of two months.

The first was former Sunday Express journalist and Muslim convert Yvonne Ridley, a presenter of the current affairs show 'The Agenda', who stood as a Respect Party candidate in local elections last year. Shortly after Ofcom began its investigations she was taken off air.

Around the same time, Abdurahman Akhtar Jafar, who was standing as a Respect Party mayoral candidate for Newham, presented the 'Politics and the Media Show'. Ofcom stated that he promoted his candidacy while failing to ensure other candidates were provided the opportunity to take part.

Ofcom gave an example of one broadcast on 27 March 2006.

Abdurahman Akhtar Jafar: "…I am also running for the executive mayor in Newham and I also visit many of the Mosques and many of the Mosques are really, really receptive….and very eager to ensure that Muslims are out there and engaging in politics because they have so many concerns….the Mosques need planning…"
Inyat Bunglawala (co-presenter): "You are our live experiment in participation…we are going to give the viewers a week by week, blow by blow account of your participation in the mainstream and what happens on D Day, on May 4."
Abdurahman Akhtar Jafar: "May 4…you are invited to come along…"
Inyat Bunglawala: "Well, we hope (he) is successful on May 4…let’s all wish him well...Insh’Allah."

Islam Channel's management claimed they were not aware of Mr Jafar's candidacy before they were contacted by the regulator. Ofcom replied that it was "clear evidence that Islam Channel Ltd could not have been properly monitoring its own output," because both the shows were found to have breached the Code on 24 occasions.

"The potential harm caused by a disregard of democratic processes such as these is considerable. These rules are in place to ensure that elections are conducted fairly and that no unfair advantage is given to candidates through promotion in the broadcast media, irrespective of whether the candidate can be shown to have actually benefited in practice," Ofcom said in its report.

The Islam Channel is a specialist religious channel that broadcasts on the Sky platform (EPG 813) and is directed at a largely Muslim audience both in Britain and around the world. Its output ranges from religious instruction programmes to current affairs and documentary programmes.

Ofcom said the lapses contributed to an "overall pattern of weak compliance" with its Broadcasting Code. It has repeatedly warned the Islam Channel in the past for failing to provide balance over programming.

It also accepted that the Islam Channel was a small organisation with limited resources, and an excessive financial penalty could damage its long term viability.

Having considered all the circumstances, it added, the "very serious breaches of the Code" still required a penalty. A £30,000 fine was thus imposed.

The channel accepted its non-compliance and that it had insufficient compliance procedures in place at the time to ensure they did not occur.

1st August update: The Islam Channel has since released a statement saying it was considering a legal challenge to Ofcom's decision.

2) Maybe It’s Because I’m a Londonister … that I Remain Unmoved by Today's Tacky Good News in the Times

Last Thursday, as at the time I commented upon here in a posting, the Times newspaper applied generous coats of whitewash to London’s Mayor Ken Livingstone in an effort to give the left-leaning trouble-maker a brand makeover that would transform him into a paragon of responsibility and moderation. Today, it is the turn of that city’s Muslim population to receive the same treatment from this same newspaper.

In a news report in today’s issue entitled ‘Poll of Muslims in London shows hidden face of a model citizenry’, Michael Binyon reports that a Gallup opinion poll of Londoners to be published tomorrow has discovered the Muslim ones to be more patriotic and moderate in their opinions than their non-Muslim counterparts.

Elsewhere, the newspaper gives over to Mr Binyon further column inches to drive home his message. In a Thunderer column entitled ‘Muslim, British and just like the rest of us’, Mr Binyon exuberantly declares that ‘here at last are the figures to… prove… most Muslims are honest, moderate, loyal citizens’.

Why do I remain unpersuaded by what Mr Binyon claims here?

Before stating my central reasons for so being, let me say straight off that not only can I neither offer nor point to any evidence to show that what Mr Binyon says about London’s Muslims is false, I most sincerely hope and pray that what he states the poll to have shown about them is indeed true of them. However, where he and I part company is over how much credence each of us thinks can rightly be attached to the reported results of the poll.

‘Why, on earth, not accept what is claimed the poll has found out about Muslims?’, I can hear the reader asking in my head as I write these words.

Well, very simply put, I think there is very good reason to doubt the impartiality of those responsible for devising and for interpreting the poll, and hence to mistrust any claims about what it supposedly has revealed about the opinions of Muslims.

The reason to mistrust the impartiality of some of those connected with the poll is that, as stated on its own website, in developing and analysing data from the World Poll, the Gallup Organisation has relied ‘on a panel of world–renowned scientists … [who] include John Esposito’. Now, John Esposito, as I explained in a related posting about the Gallup poll in February, is the founding Director of the Prince Alwaleed Bin-Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University in Washington DC which changed its name to its present one, after his university where it is based received a gift of $20 million from the man to whose name his centre changed its own.

As I reported in my posting about the Times’ encomium of Ken Livingstone last week, this Saudi benefactor is known to be someone who is prepared to use his fabulous wealth and great influence to shape world-opinion in a way favourable to Muslims in general and to the Saudi Wahhabi regime in particular. He also happens to be the single largest share-holder in the holding company that owns, among many other news-media, … the Times.

In the final paragraph of his report about the results of the Gallup poll, Michael Binyon demurely states: ‘The poll is financed by the Gallup Organisation, and so it claims that it has no partisan interest in any of its findings’. The same, however, can hardly be said about one of those most who have been closely involved in devising it and in interpreting its results.

It is Mr Binyon’s failure even to declare Professor Esposito’s involvement in the poll, and the interest Professor Posito must undoubtedly have in the poll having a certain outcome, that makes me regard Mr Binyon's piece of journalism in today's Times as tacky in the extreme, if you know what I mean.

Those wanting an eye-opener about how Saudi money is being used to promote Wahhabism worldwide should click onto this link to a 2002 article by Steven Stalinksy, executive director of MEMRI.

http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Area=sr&ID=SR01202



3) British government and councils fund islamist schools that peddle extremism ;

http://www.socialcohesion.co.uk/pdf/HateOnTheState.pdf


4) Arab investment overseas will rise, say experts
vanhelsing | 17 Mar, 2006 18:14


Posted: 15-03-2006 , 11:46 GMT
Arab investment overseas, whether through government-owned portfolios or oil stabilisation finds, will continue to rise through shrewd allocation of funds, according to speakers at the upcoming IPO and Asset Management Middle East conference, organised by MEED, in Dubai on March 27 – 28.


GCC investments abroad have come under the spotlight in the last 12 months, notably with Dubai-based DPI World’s purchase of P&O, the UK port and ferry operator. This follows on from a series of high-profile investments by Dubai government-owned institutions that have grabbed international headlines.

More than $5 billion has already been spent in the last 12 months adding to a strong foreign portfolio that now includes the Tussauds Group, the UK’s Inchcape Shipping Services and a billion-dollar stake in DaimlerChrysler. In late January, Dubai International Capital (DIC), the international investment arm of Dubai Holding, announced plans to set up a $15 billion fund to invest in global blue-chip firms.


Peggy Farley, president and CEO of the US-based Ascent Capital Management, said: “The high-profile investments we have seen are part of an ongoing diversification of the Gulf economies.

“While Dubai’s investments have made headlines, Abu Dhabi and Kuwait have channelled a percentage of their income into the global equity, bond and real estate markets through Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and Kuwait Investment Authority.


“Dubai has leveraged a mass of equity from the proceeds of land sales to feed the booming real estate market, and these judicious investments will continue both at home and abroad.��?


Acquisitions by Dubai have been highly leveraged, utilising international bonds and local bank debt. As an example, Dubai Ports, Customs & Free Zone Corporation in January issued a $3.5 billion sukuk – the world’s largest – designed primarily to fund the P&O purchase.

In January, the UAE-based investment company Istithmar acquired 109 million shares, or 2.39 per cent, of Time Warner Inc. for $2 billion; the previous November, the same company bought New York property 230 Park Avenue for $705 million.

Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has built up an impressive portfolio in the two decades since it was set up by the late UAE President, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al Nahyan to diversify the oil-dependent economy. It is now the world’s second largest institutional investor, with assets estimated to be well in excess of $300 billion. Meanwhile, the Abu Dhabi-based Mubadala Development Company acquired 5 per cent last year of Ferrari last year.


The Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA) estimates that the Kingdom’s private sector invests approximately $5 billion abroad, while Kuwait has as much as $250 billion invested across Europe.

At the recent World Economic Forum in Davos, Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) confirmed plans to buy a 10 per cent stake in Industrial & Commercial Bank of China. Its partners are understood to include Abu Dhabi and Qatari investors.

Conference chairman Edmund O’Sullivan said: “Gulf countries have liquidity levels that are rising by the day, thanks to shrewd investment of petroleum income over the years, and rising oil prices.

“GCC money is flowing around the region and on an international stage, while foreign direct investment into the GCC continues to rise – it rose 91 per cent to $9.95 billion from the United States alone in 2005.��?

The Middle East’s spiralling IPO market, which is tipped to number well over 100 listings by 2008, and market predictions make up the agenda for MEED’s IPO and Asset Management Middle East conference in Dubai, March 27 – 28.

This year the event has been extended into the IPO sector for the first time, with delegates able to attend both days or just one, according to their area of focus.

Already confirmed as speakers are: Sheikha Lubna bint Khaled Al Qasimi, the UAE’s Minister of Economy and Planning; Dr Henry Azzam, chairman of Dubai International Financial Exchange (DIFX) and Dr Habib Al Mulla, chairman of Dubai Financial Services Authority.

MEED’s IPO and Asset Management Middle East will be held at the Al Murooj Rotana in Dubai, March 27 – 28.

Gold sponsors are Dubai Bank and Shuaa Capital.

© 2006 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)


5) Donations to Labour Party from Arab millionaires

From The Sunday Times
August 26, 2007

Brown hit by new sleaze row over Labour funds
Robert Winnett and Holly Watt

LABOUR is facing an official inquiry into an alleged front organisation, financed by millionaire Muslim businessmen, which has donated more than £300,000 to the party.

The electoral watchdog, which polices political funding, confirmed that it was investigating donations to Labour from a group called Muslim Friends of Labour. Its findings are expected to lead to a full-blown inquiry — the first potential sleaze probe to hit Labour since Gordon Brown became prime minister in June.

Imran Khand, a Glasgow-based entrepreneur, is revealed as a leading financial backer behind Muslim Friends, which funnelled £100,000 a month to Labour between March and June.

As his money is paid to Muslim Friends - rather than directly to the Labour party - his identity has until now remained secret. The Electoral Commission is probing whether Labour has broken laws on the disclosure of donations by hiding the true source of its financing.

Khand is a close associate of Mohammad Sarwar, the controversial Labour MP who chairs the organisation. Sarwar was embroiled in a vote-rigging scandal in the late 1990s which saw him suspended from the parliamentary Labour party. He was later cleared of the allegations in the High Court.

Khand has recently set up a series of companies with a Pakistani arms salesman and is also funding a British parliamentary inquiry into “tackling terrorism” via another organisation.

He has never been publicly named as a Labour donor although Muslim Friends has risen to become the party’s second most generous nontrade union benefactor. It is understood that most Labour Muslim MPs and peers are members.

Muslim Friends, which until recently gave only modest amounts, is set up as an “unincorporated association” which does not publish accounts or reveal the source of its funding. It is registered to a PO box address in south London.

Labour politicians have previously criticised the Conservatives for accepting money from a similar unincorporated association involving Robert Edmiston, a Midlands car dealer.

The watchdog said: “We have raised questions with the Labour party about these donations. We are looking into it. Inquiries are at a preliminary stage.”

Yesterday Sarwar, who is to step down at the next election, refused to reveal who funded the donations. “I will not name names. We have made a decision not to release the information. That is the decision of the board of Muslim Friends of Labour,” he said.

He added that the organisation was “very powerful” and was regularly consulted by ministers drawing up policies of interest to the Muslim community.

Another senior member of Muslim Friends disclosed that Khand was the leading benefactor. He revealed that Sarwar, himself a multi-millionaire, had also provided funding.

One leading Muslim Labour figure said: “I am staggered how much money they are giving suddenly. It started off in the wake of 2001 when Muslims were facing serious challenges, but now it seems to be Sarwar and his friends.”

Last week Khand refused to comment on his donations to Muslim Friends.

Yesterday, when asked to justify its decision to accept donations from Muslim Friends, the Labour party said it would take steps to ensure that donors to the group were made public.

Have your say

A rather sinister sounding organisation. By chance is it currently applying to for a change in organisation status to a registered charity? This would tie in with Brown's recent airong of the idea of allowing large political donations from charities.

As I thought at the time, this would allow precisely this type of indirect donation from a few wealthy sources to be channelled throught charitable organisations, although I admit I had rather thought it would be The Smith Institute that was a more likely vehicle.

This affair has the smell of a political equivalent of money laundering about it and should be painted with the same colour stain to remind us of the underlying nature of this proposal when the time comes to examine altenrative political funding systems.

It is regrettable and indicative of the level morality within political circles that we can no longer trust the legislature to abide the same set of rules that their laws seek to impose on thiose outside of The House.

Edwin Thornber, Bucharest,




Labour donations outstrip Tories but both parties remain in the red


· Conservatives nudge ahead with state subsidies
· Brown bounce attracts cash from City and unions

David Hencke, Westminster correspondent
Wednesday August 22, 2007
The Guardian


Labour has taken a lead over the Tories in the amount of donations the party received from private sources for the first time since David Cameron became Conservative leader in 2005.

The Electoral Commission's quarterly figures show Labour attracted just over £5m from private individuals, businesses and unions compared with £4.5m donated to the Tories. But the Tories still attracted the most cash - £6.3m - because they received an additional £1.78m in state subsidies available only to opposition parties.


However, both main parties are still heavily in debt, with Labour owing close to £20m while the Tories have net liabilities of £9m despite the sale of Conservative central office. The level of Labour's debt is likely to call into question Gordon Brown's ability to hold an early election.

The figures from March until the end of June also reveal that Monaco tax exile Lord Laidlaw, who has absented himself following the row with the House of Lords appointments commission over his refusal to honour his promise to pay British taxes, is still a regular big donor to the Tories - having given nearly £270,000 this year through his Scottish firm, Abbey Business. This is despite his actions being condemned by Mr Cameron. At the time George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, defended his support as long as the "donations were properly registered". But yesterday it turned out that two donations worth £166,000 were registered late, breaking the rules.

The rise in Labour's fortunes seems to reflect the Brown bounce with a number of big donations from City figures matching large contributions from the unions. The biggest donor was Mahmoud Khayami, an Iranian-born industrialist. He has given three donations totalling £510,000 and is promising to give up to £1m.

Other big donors are Sir Ron Cohen, the private equity millionaire, who gave £250,000, taking his total donations to Labour since 2001 to £1.8m; City financier Nigel Doughty, whose £250,000 takes his donations to more than £1m since 2005; and Peter Coates, of online gambling company Bet365, who gave £100,000.

Labour also received a big increase in donations from the unions. The largest union, Unite, has given more than £1.3m from its Amicus and TGWU wings. Unison gave £462,000 and Usdaw gave £304,000.

Altogether it suggests Labour is starting to recover from its downturn in donations during the "cash for peerages" row - donations are running at nearly twice the rate of the same quarter in 2003.

The Tories continued to receive large contributions from long-standing donors such as Lord Harris, who gave another £287,898. Their biggest donors were Edinburgh grain merchant Philip Wilson (Grain) Ltd, which gave £300,000, and property developer Gallagher UK Ltd, which contributed £250,000.

The Liberal Democrats received £597,169 in public funds. The biggest private donors were Alpha Healthcare Ltd (£125,000) and the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust (£122,217).

The Scottish National party received £623,609, of which £325,000 came from Stagecoach chairman Brian Souter. His contribution amounted to half the donations to the party. Actor Sir Sean Connery gave £30,000.

Who's giving?

Top political donors April-June 2007

Labour

Mahmoud Khayami

£510,000

Sir Ron Cohen

£250,000 (£1.8m since 2001)

Nigel Doughty

£250,000 (£1m since 2005)

Jon Aisbitt

£250,000 (£750,000 since 2005)

Conservative

Philip Wilson (grain) Ltd

£300,000 (£556,000 since 2001)

Lord Harris of Peckham

£287,000 (£969,000 since 2002)

Lord Ashcroft

£150,000 (£1.1m since 2001)

Nigel Alliance

£106,000 (£374,000 since 2006)

Michael Hintze

£101,500 (£489,900 since 2002)

===========================================

Labour given £1m donation


Islamic billionaire who has funded Christian academy schools encouraged to make further gesture by party's 'faith task force'

Jamie Doward and Ned Temko
Sunday June 3, 2007
The Observer


The Labour party has been given £1m by an Iranian-born industrialist who has been bankrolling two of the government's flagship school academies set up to promote Christian values.

The donation from multi-millionaire Mahmoud Khayami, a prominent Muslim who fled Iran after the fall of the Shah, is one of the largest received by Labour, eclipsed only by the £2m the party received from Lakshmi Mittal, the steel billionaire, and a similar amount given by Lord Sainsbury.

The gift comes amid the 'cash for honours' row, which has led to allegations that Labour sold titles to influential businessmen in exchange for sponsoring city academies. The Crown Prosecution Service is considering whether to bring charges.
It will also reignite the debate over the relationship between Labour and religious groups. Khayami, who has lived in Britain since 1979, is a major donor to the United Learning Trust (ULT), an Anglican foundation headed by Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury. The trust, which, according to its mission statement, runs academies on 'the founding Christian principles of respect, service and compassion, discipline and hard work', is to open two city academies in Sheffield later this year, which will be funded by the Khayami Foundation charity.

Critics of academies accuse the government of allowing undue influence to wealthy religious groups, as sponsors are given a say in the running and curriculum of the academies they sponsor. 'How can a Labour government not feel beholden to someone donating so much?' asked Keith Porteous Wood, director of the National Secular Society, which campaigns against faith schools.

But supporters of the ULT, which already runs academies in Moss Side, Manchester, Lambeth, south London and Northampton, say its schools take pupils irrespective of their beliefs and that its ethos is on tolerance. The ULT's schools boast a 95 per cent pass rate at GCSE compared with a national average of 59 per cent and its board comprises members of all faiths.

Last night Tony Blair said: 'I would like to thank Mahmoud Khayami for making such a generous donation to the Labour party and for supporting our values of economic prosperity coupled with social justice.

'Mahmoud Khayami is a committed promoter of inter-religious understanding among Jewish, Christian and Muslim communities in the UK and abroad and is widely known for his widespread philanthropic work.'

Khayami's relationship with Labour was fostered by the party's newly appointed chair of its faith task force, public-relations executive Anthony Bailey - an influential Roman Catholic and ULT board member whose connections stretch from the House of Saud to the Vatican.

'Over the last five years I've brought Mr Khayami into contact with the Labour party at different levels,' Bailey said. 'His decision to donate comes at an important time for the party. He wanted to pay tribute to Tony Blair but also to show his support for Labour in the future under Gordon Brown.'

Khayami, who has sponsored a number of high-profile debates with a view to increasing understanding of Islam in the West, has donated £530,000 to Labour now and pledged the rest of the £1m in the near future.

Although close to both Blair and Lord (Andrew) Adonis, the education minister who has championed academies, his donation, made shortly before Gordon Brown enters Number 10, is a sign he is keen to make a long-standing commitment to the party.

'He's incredibly generous,' Bailey said of Khayami. 'But his belief has always been to support things quietly, without trumpets sounding. He's deeply committed to improving educational standards in the UK.'

Khayami said: 'Over this last 10 years I have been proud to support the Labour party led by Tony Blair. I have witnessed at first hand the very real difference that this Labour government has made to communities across Britain with its focus on economic growth, raising people's aspiration and the delivery of social justice.'

Khayami was one of the leading champions of Iran's industrialisation during the Sixties and Seventies. He masterminded the production of the popular Peykan cars, which were exported to neighbouring countries and Eastern Europe in the 1970s. He also founded the Bank of Iranian Industries, which aimed to bolster Iranian manufacturing, and the Kourosh Department Stores, the first large retail chain stores in Iran. In 1979, following the overthrow of the Shah, he moved to London, managing the distribution of Mercedes-Benz cars. In 2004, in recognition of his philanthropic work in the former Yugoslavia, Pope John Paul II made him a Knight of the Order of Pope Saint Sylvester - an almost unprecedented recognition for a non-Catholic.



---------------------------------------------------------------

From The Sunday Times
August 7, 2005

Labour to offer Asian donors seats in Lords
Robert Winnett, Whitehall Correspondent

LAKSHMI MITTAL, Britain’s richest man who recently gave £2m to the Labour party, is being lined up for a seat in the Lords. He is one of a number of successful British-based Asians, including Sir Gulam Noon, a ready-meals tycoon, expected to be offered peerages this year.
The honours will prove controversial as both men are big Labour party donors and Mittal’s previous links with Tony Blair sparked a “cash-for-favours” row in 2001.

The ennobling of Mittal and Noon would follow that of other major Labour donors including Lord Sainsbury, Lord Drayson, Lord Hamlyn, Lord Paul and Lord Bhattacharrya. Government sources say it wants more successful Asian businessmen in the Lords to act as role models for disaffected youngsters from ethnic minorities.

The peerages would have to be approved by the Lords Appointments Commission.

A source said: “Mittal and Noon are on the list for the next round of peers. We are expecting criticism about the donations, but Mittal has risen from nothing to being one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the country — just the sort of person you want in the Lords.”

Last week, friends of Mittal, who runs the world’s biggest steel firm, said that he was very interested in becoming a peer. “He has aspirations to become a lord. His recent donation is an indication of his desire to become more involved in politics,” said a close friend.

Noon said he would be honoured to be in the Lords and has met Blair to discuss how to engage the Muslim community following the terrorist attacks.

A peerage would mark the latest achievement in Mittal’s meteoric rise since arriving in Britain a decade ago. He was born in 1950 in an Indian village without electricity before moving to Calcutta to join the family steel company. In 1976 he went to Indonesia and began building his fortune.

Following a string of takeovers, Mittal rose to run the world’s biggest steel company last year. His firm, Mittal Steel, employs 165,000 people worldwide and produced 60m tons of steel last year.

The Sunday Times Rich List calculates his wealth at £14.8 billion, surpassing Roman Abramovich and the Duke of Westminster. Globally, only Bill Gates and Warren Buffett have larger individual fortunes.

Despite being an Indian citizen, Mittal would still be eligible to sit in the Lords as India is in the Commonwealth.

Last year, Mittal paid a world record £70m for a house in west London that has garage space for 20 cars and was furnished using more than 9,000 sq ft of marble — much of it from the quarry used for the Taj Mahal.

He also threw Britain’s most lavish wedding, reportedly paying £30m for the six-day celebration in Paris with entertainment from Kylie Minogue.

He has been a long-standing Labour supporter and first donated £16,000 in April 1997. However, a gift of £125,000 in 2001 attracted controversy after it emerged that Blair had written to the Romanian prime minister following Mittal’s bid for a state-owned steel plant.

Last month, a week after the July 7 bombings, Labour took the unusual step of announcing it had just received a further £2m donation from Mittal.

Noon’s rise has been less controversial. He arrived from Bombay 35 years ago and started a firm importing Indian sweets. In the 1980s he diversified into providing ready-cooked curries sold in shops, including Sainsbury’s, and the Rich List now puts his wealth at £65m.

He was knighted in 2002 and has held positions on a number of official bodies, including Transport for London. He has given more than £200,000 to Labour.

Noon, a Muslim, has been consulted by the government over its response to the terrorist attacks. He said last week he backed Blair’s announcement to crack down on radical elements. “ If people want to live in this country they must follow the rules or it is right and proper for them to leave,” he said.

He added that he had not been approached about a peerage but would want to “give something back to the country”. A spokesman for Mittal said the billionaire had not been approached but would consider a peerage if asked.

Blair has a track record of giving peerages to key donors. Labour sources say wealthy people support the party with gifts but this should not disqualify them from peerages.