Conservatives pay back further £20,000 in donations from convicted tax evader and wife
According to the latest electoral commission data the four political parties that have reported receiving donations over £7,500 were:
Conservative Party – £492,512 Labour Party – £1,109,946 Liberal Democrats – £50,000 United Kingdom Independence Party (Ukip) – £8,000
Ukip also reported £63,000 worth of donations late. The Commission say they are in correspondence with the party to establish the reasons for this.
Among the list of Conservative donors are Stanley Tollman and his wife Beatrice, who each gave £10,000 in the second week of the campaign. Mrs Tollman also gave £20,000 the week before.
On Monday, The Independent newspaper revealed Mr Tollman had pleaded guilty to tax evasion in the US in 2008.
It also discovered Ms Tollman, who founded the luxury hotel chain Red Carnation Group, had been charged with conspiracy to evade tax, but the charges were dismissed.
The findings prompted the Conservatives to return all of the money received from Mrs Tollman, who the paper said had donated more than £50,000 to them since 2011.
A party spokesman confirmed today that all the money received – including the additional £20,000 given most recently – had now been returned to the couple.
A spokesman for Mr and Mrs Tollman told The Independent: “In so far as Mrs Tollman is concerned you will see she is of good character and was acquitted of all charges.”
Responding to Mr Tollman’s guilty plea, a spokesman for the family added: “Stanley Tollman admitted to having failed to report on his US tax return two bank accounts situated outside the US. It was that omission for which he was sentenced to one day’s unsupervised probation.
“The reality is that the financial settlement was the only means through which his family were going to be able to get on and lead their lives without being coerced by the Americans.”