What Labour is doing to keep the welfare rebels quiet

Published

8 months ago

March 28, 2025

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Government whips will be overestimating the number of Labour rebels over welfare cuts as a form of “expectation management”, Dame Harriet Harman has said.

Speaking to Beth Rigby on the Electoral Dysfunction podcast, the Labour peer and former deputy leader shed light on some of the dark arts that have traditionally been associated with government whipping operations – whereby MPs are encouraged to vote in line with the government.

Sir Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are facing a looming rebellion over the chancellor’s decision to impose nearly £5bn worth of welfare cuts, as outlined in the spring statement on Wednesday.

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Dame Harriet said the “first thing” the government whips will be doing is suggesting that the rebellion will be larger than it is – so it looks less damaging when smaller numbers emerge.

“You’ll see floating around that there’s going to be 50 Labour MPs rebelling against their own government within a year of having been elected on a Labour manifesto,” she explained.

“And probably that’s because they think they’ll be considerably fewer than that. And they’re just setting the expectation.”

Alongside this, Dame Harriet said there has always been talk about whips – who are responsible for enforcing party discipline – “blackmailing people with private information”.

She said that while this used to be the case when she was first elected as an MP in the 1980s, it would not be happening under the current government.

However, she said the whips will have a “spreadsheet of every single one of the 411 Labour members of parliament because the whips’ job is to get the government business through”.

“They’ll be identifying those who think that they might be at risk of voting against or abstaining,” she said.

“And they will talk to them, and they’ll be reminding them that actually, they really need to be supporting the government and think about the good things the government’s doing – think about the waiting lists coming down in your area.

“Don’t destabilize the government when we’ve only just started, because you know you want to focus the minds of everybody in your constituency on the fact that things are getting better in some areas.

“So they’ll be saying: ‘You promised you’d be voting with the whip. How can you be breaking that promise?'”

A number of Labour MPs have already expressed their concerns at the changes, particularly following the government’s own impact assessment which stated that around 250,000 families – including 50,000 children – could be pushed into poverty.

Debbie Abrahams, the MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth and the chair of the work and pensions select committee, said: “All the evidence points to cuts in welfare leading to severe poverty and worsened health conditions. How will making people sicker and poorer get people into jobs?”

And Leeds MP Richard Burgon added: “Making cuts instead of taxing wealth is a political choice, and taking away the personal independence payments from so many disabled people is an especially cruel choice.

“A disabled person who can’t cut up their own food without assistance, and can’t go to the toilet without assistance, and can’t wash themselves without assistance will lose their personal independence payment.”

Politics

Thodex CEO found dead: How this $2B crypto scam changed Turkish law

Published

3 hours ago

November 8, 2025

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Thodex CEO found dead: How this B crypto scam changed Turkish law

Faruk Fatih Özer was found dead in his prison cell on Nov. 1. The former CEO of now-defunct crypto exchange Thodex was serving an 11,000-year sentence for running one of the largest crypto scams in history.

His death marks the latest turn in the Thodex saga, with ripple effects so significant they altered Turkish cryptocurrency laws.

The initial details of Özer’s death point to suicide, but the investigation is still ongoing. It has once more brought Thodex back into the spotlight.

Here’s a look back at Özer’s story, how the crypto exchange impacted Turkish law and how it may have contributed to the country’s increased crypto adoption.

$2-billion Thodex scam sees raids, arrest and CEO out on the lam

On April 21, 2021, Thodex cryptocurrency exchange suddenly shut down trading and withdrawals. The initial announcement read that this could continue for four to five days. As Cointelegraph Turkey reported at the time, the exchange claimed that this was to improve its operations with the help of “world-renowned banks and funding companies.”

But local media reported that Özer had fled to Thailand with over $2 billion in funds as part of an exit scam. There were also reports that police had raided the exchange’s offices in Istanbul.

Istanbul’s chief prosecutor’s office corroborated the reports the following day. It announced a probe into Thodex and said police had arrested 62 people allegedly involved in the scam. Özer denied the accusations, claiming his trip abroad was to meet foreign investors.

As of April 30, 2021, a Turkish court decided to jail six suspects, including family members of the missing CEO and senior company employees, pending trial. Interpol also issued a red notice for Özer.

“When he is caught with the red notice, we have extradition agreements with a large part of these countries. God willing he will be caught and he will be returned,” said Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu.

Özer managed to evade capture for over a year. Albanian authorities eventually detained him on Aug. 30, 2022. He attempted to appeal extradition in court, but the decision was upheld, and Özer was in Turkish custody by April 30, 2023, two years after the scandal began.

*Özer was detained by Turkish authorities after being extradited from Albania. Source:* AA

The case against Özer was swift. In July 2023, just three months after arriving in Turkey, he was sentenced to seven months and 15 days in prison for failing to submit certain documents requested by the Tax Inspection Board during the trial.

On Sept. 8, 2023, the Anatolian 9th High Criminal Court sentenced Özer, along with two of his siblings, to 11,196 years, 10 months and 15 days in prison, along with a $5-million fine.

In court, Özer claimed that he and his family were facing false accusations. He said, “I am smart enough to manage all institutions in the world. This is evident from the company I founded at the age of 22. If I were to establish a criminal organization, I would not act so amateurishly. … It is clear that the suspects in the file have been victims for more than 2 years.”

Özer was serving his sentence at the Tekirdağ No. 1 F-Type High Security Closed Penal Institution when he died. F-Type prisons are high-security institutions reserved for political prisoners, members of organized crime syndicates and other armed groups serving an aggravated life sentence.

Human rights advocates have repeatedly raised concerns about the conditions at F-Type prisons. In 2007, Amnesty International noted “harsh and arbitrary” disciplinary treatments, as well as isolation.

Turkey changes its laws to protect investors

The Thomex scandal and its ensuing fallout were so significant that they drove the Turkish government to change its policies toward cryptocurrencies.

Immediately following news of Özer fleeing the country, the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey banned crypto payments and prohibited payment providers from offering fiat on-ramps for crypto exchanges. The official notice outlawed “any direct or indirect usage of crypto assets in payment services and electronic money issuance.” Notably, the ban excluded banks, meaning that users can still deposit lira onto crypto exchange accounts using bank transfers.

The ban aimed to ensure financial stability, while other agencies like the Capital Markets Board (CMB) and the Financial Crimes Investigation Board (MASAK) moved to legitimize trading activities. In May 2021, MASAK amended money laundering and terrorism financing laws to include provisions for cryptocurrency.

By 2024, the “Law on Amendments to the Capital Markets Law” came into effect. This built on the initial changes in 2021, which included extensive consumer protection measures in addition to provisions on licensing and reporting.

These new measures, which also aimed to move Turkey off the Financial Action Task Force’s “gray list” of countries with inadequate Anti-Money Laundering measures, have in turn helped spur the local crypto industry.

Chainalysis’ “2025 Geography of Crypto Report” found that Turkey led the Middle East and North Africa in value received in crypto. Trading activity also spiked last year.

In the long term, the Thodex scandal may have led to increased crypto adoption in the country, but only after it rocked the Turkish crypto industry and left many investors out to dry. It also resulted in the imprisonment and death of its orchestrator and CEO.

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