Rishi Sunak criticised for ‘surprise’ honours list including major Tory donor Mohamed Mansour
Rishi Sunak has been criticised for announcing a “surprise” round of honours – including a knighthood for a major donor to the Conservative Party.
It was announced on the Thursday before the Easter bank holiday weekend that Mohamed Mansour was being knighted for business, charity and political service – he had given £5m to the Tories in 2023 and is a senior treasurer at the party.
A number of Conservative MPs were also made knights and dames.
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Labour’s chair, Anneliese Dodds, said Mr Sunak‘s nominations were “either the arrogant act of an entitled man who’s stopped caring what the public thinks, or the demob-happy self-indulgence of someone who doesn’t expect to be prime minister much longer”.
Asked by Sky News if Labour would rule out giving donors honours if they were in government, Ms Dodds said giving money should not be an “automatic pass”.
Following the announcement, Mr Mansour said: “This award is the greatest honour of my life. I am thrilled and hugely grateful.
“This award would have meant so much to my father and mother. I wish they could have lived to see this day. This honour is for them, for the values they taught my siblings and I and for everything they did for us.”
Downing Street sources highlighted Mr Mansour’s work supporting charities – including financially backing a memorial to those who died due to COVID.
Speaking to Sky News, Conservative peer and polling expert Lord Robert Hayward said the public would be “unhappy” with the move.
While some non-political figures – like director Christopher Nolan – were also knighted, it’s the political acts that will draw attention.
Mohamed Mansour, who has been knighted by Rishi Sunak. Pic: Reuters
This will hardly strengthen confidence in the honours system
We’ve been here before.
Questions over who gets gongs stretch back decades.
The appointment of Tory donor and treasurer Mohamed Mansour inevitably relights the row.
Labour has accused Rishi Sunak of being “demob happy” and “self-indulgent”.
Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to clean up cronyism in the honours system.
What that means in practice is unclear, although he has said he wouldn’t have a resignation honours list if he became prime minister.
We will wait and see if knighthoods are dished out to major Labour donors if the party makes it into government.
In fact, it’s the timing of this announcement that is potentially more interesting than the contents.
There isn’t usually an “Easter Honours List”.
That’s fuelled speculation of attempts to square off supporters ahead of an early general election.
Government sources deny that and say the answer is purely administrative – appointments to the privy council from the devolved assemblies were required, and so the prime minister also wanted to take the opportunity to honour other individuals too.
It’s a somewhat curious explanation.
But whatever the truth, the sight of another honour being handed out to someone who’s very much in the fold of party politics will hardly strengthen confidence in the behind-the-scenes machinations of Westminster.
Lord Haywood said: “I think people don’t like it, there’s no question about that.
“The problem is that you’ve got people who are genuine philanthropists who also give money to a political party, and that’s where the line isn’t differentiated.”
He added that he was “really surprised” by the timing of the list – but it probably doesn’t say anything about the timing of a general election.
Normally, honours are granted at New Year’s on the monarch’s birthday, or after the resignation of a prime minister, although this is a convention not a rule.
The timing of the announcement, while parliament is in recess, has also raised eyebrows – although sources suggested the timing was linked to the need to make appointments to the Privy Council, including the new Welsh First Minister Vaughan Gething.
Tory MP Philip Davies was one of the Conservative MPs to be made knight. He is known for hosting a television show on GB News with his wife, fellow Conservative MP and minister Esther McVey.
Ex-sports minister Tracey Crouch will become a dame having run a review into reforming the UK football system, and farming minister Mark Spencer will also become a sir.
Treasury Select Committee chair Harriett Baldwin – a Conservative MP – will also become a dame.
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Away from politics, Mr Nolan and wife and producer Emma Thomas have been handed honours following the release of award-winning biopic Oppenheimer.
Dr Demis Hassabis, who co-founded Google’s DeepMind AI business, was also made a knight.
Millionaire Tory donor Malcolm Offord has defected to Reform UK, saying he would be campaigning “tirelessly” to “remove this rotten SNP government”.
Nigel Farage announced the former Conservative life peer’s defection during a rally in the Scottish town of Falkirk, where regular anti-immigration protests have taken place outside the Cladhan Hotel – which is being used to house asylum seekers.
Mr Farage, Reform UK’s leader, said he was “delighted” to welcome Greenock-born Lord Offord to Reform, describing his defection as “a brave and historic act”.
He added: “He will take Reform UK Scotland to a new level.”
During a speech, Lord Offord, who previously donated nearly £150,000 to the Tories, said he would be quitting the Conservative Party and giving up his place in the House of Lords as he prepares to campaign for a seat in Holyrood in May.
The 61-year-old said he wanted to restore Scotland to a “prosperous, happy, healthy country”.
“Scotland needs Reform and Reform is coming to Scotland,” he told the rally.
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“Today I can announce that I am resigning from the Conservative Party. Today I am joining Reform UK and today I announce my intention to stand for Reform in the Holyrood election in May next year.
“And that means that from today, for the next five months, day and night, I shall be campaigning with all of you tirelessly for two objectives.
“The first objective is to remove this rotten SNP government after 18 years, and the second is to present a positive vision for Scotland inside the UK, to restore Scotland to being a prosperous, proud, healthy and happy country.”
The latest defection comes as Mr Farage finds himself at the centre of allegations of racism dating back to his time in school.
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Claims made against Nigel Farage
Sky News reported on Saturday that a former schoolfriend of Mr Farage claimed he sang antisemitic songs to Jewish schoolmates – and had a “big issue with anyone called Patel”.
Jean-Pierre Lihou, 61, was initially friends with the Reform UK leader when he arrived at Dulwich College in the 1970s, at the time when Mr Farage is accused of saying antisemitic and other racist remarks by more than a dozen pupils.
Mr Farage has said he “never directly racially abused anybody” at Dulwich and said there is a “strong political element” to the allegations coming out 49 years later.
Reform’s deputy leader Richard Tice has called the ex-classmates “liars”.
A Reform UK spokesman accused Sky News of “scraping the barrel” and being “desperate to stop us winning the next election”.
The European Commission’s proposal to expand the powers of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) is raising concerns about the centralization of the bloc’s licensing regime, despite signaling deeper institutional ambitions for its capital markets structure.
On Thursday, the Commission published a package proposing to “direct supervisory competences” for key pieces of market infrastructure, including crypto-asset service providers (CASPs), trading venues and central counterparties to ESMA, Cointelegraph reported.
Concerningly, the ESMA’s jurisdiction would extend to both the supervision and licensing of all European crypto and financial technology (fintech) firms, potentially leading to slower licensing regimes and hindering startup development, according to Faustine Fleuret, head of public affairs at decentralized lending protocol Morpho.
“I am even more concerned that the proposal makes ESMA responsible for both the authorisation and the supervision of CASPs, not only the supervision,” she told Cointelegraph.
The proposal still requires approval from the European Parliament and the Council, which are currently under negotiation.
If adopted, ESMA’s role in overseeing EU capital markets would more closely resemble the centralized framework of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, a concept first proposed by European Central Bank (ECB) President Christine Lagarde in 2023.
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EU plan to centralize licensing under ESMA creates crypto and fintech slowdown concerns
The proposal to “centralize” this oversight under a single regulatory body seeks to address the differences in national supervisory practices and uneven licensing regimes, but risks slowing down overall crypto industry development, Elisenda Fabrega, general counsel at Brickken asset tokenization platform, told Cointelegraph.
“Without adequate resources, this mandate may become unmanageable, leading to delays or overly cautious assessments that could disproportionately affect smaller or innovative firms.”
“Ultimately, the effectiveness of this reform will depend less on its legal form and more on its institutional execution,” including ESMA’s operational capacity, independence and cooperation “channels” with member states, she said.
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The broader package aims to boost wealth creation for EU citizens by making the bloc’s capital markets more competitive with those of the US.
The US stock market is worth approximately $62 trillion, or 48% of the global equity market, while the EU stock market’s cumulative value sits around $11 trillion, representing 9% of the global share, according to data from Visual Capitalist.
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