Latest news with #MauritiusDeal
Telegraph
23-05-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
‘Lying' Starmer reported to watchdog over true cost of Chagos deal
The official statistics watchdog has been asked to investigate Sir Keir Starmer's claims about the cost of giving away the Chagos Islands. The Prime Minister was accused of 'lying to the public' on Thursday as he signed an agreement to give the Indian Ocean islands to Mauritius and rent back a key military base. He claimed the deal would cost £101 million annually, amounting to £3.4 billion over 99 years. However, the true cost is likely to exceed £30 billion in cash terms because of rising inflation and additional schemes to fund development projects in Mauritius. The Tories have now written to Sir Robert Chote, the chairman of the UK Statistics Authority, asking him to examine the numbers cited by the Prime Minister. In the letter, James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, accused Sir Keir of 'misuse of statistics'. As the statistics watchdog, Sir Robert can rebuke ministers in a letter if he believes they have misled the public. The criticism can be highly embarrassing for ministers, but he has no further powers. In his letter, Mr Cartlidge said Sir Keir was guilty of a 'statistical sleight of hand' and may have breached the code of practice on statistics. 'Yesterday, when asked about the cost of the deal, the Prime Minister claimed it would be £3.4 billion, even after accounting for inflation,' he said. 'This figure is inaccurate. Independent analysis suggests that, once a conservative rate of inflation is accounted for, the true cost of the deal is likely to be in excess of £30 billion. 'That's a difference of £27 billion – a substantial amount that could mislead the public about the real financial cost.' Britain has agreed to pay to rent the Diego Garcia military base for the next 99 years, and contribute more than £1 billion in development funding. Sir Keir said on Thursday that the average annual cost of the deal would be £101 million. This figure over 99 years would equate to £10 billion – but the Prime Minister claimed that the total 'net cost' over a century would be £3.4 billion. This is because the Government has performed calculations on the payments that factor in 'the value society attaches to present as opposed to future consumption' and an estimated rate of inflation over time. This is called the 'social time preference rate'. Analysis by The Telegraph shows the cash-terms cost is likely to be around £30 billion, including a century of lease payments, most of which will be increased in line with inflation, plus two schemes to support native people of the Chagos Islands and pay for infrastructure in Mauritius. In his letter, Mr Cartlidge wrote: 'I understand the Government has used the social time preference rate (STPR) to calculate the figure used by the Prime Minister. The figure is therefore a representation of 'social time preference', not a representation of the direct cost to the taxpayer. However, the Prime Minister stated that this is the 'net cost'. 'The Prime Minister has therefore misrepresented the figure by stating that it is a net cost when in reality it is a figure for the social time preference. 'Such discounting in the public sector is intended to allow the costs and benefits of different policies with varying time spans to be compared on a common basis. 'But in this case, it is being used as a statistical sleight of hand to hide the true cost to taxpayers of this surrender deal and appears to be a breach in the code of practice on statistics which states that 'statistics, data and explanatory material should be presented impartially and objectively'.' He also said Sir Keir should have published the source statistics. 'The Government's failure to publish the statistical methodology therefore appears to be in breach of the code,' he said. 'As the UK Statistics Authority, your role is to promote transparency and accuracy in the use of public data. 'I therefore ask you to investigate whether the Prime Minister's figure follows the code of practice on statistics to make sure that public confidence in public statistics is upheld.' On Thursday, both Conservatives and Reform UK accused Sir Keir of misleading the public. Dame Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, said: 'Labour are lying to British taxpayers with their made-up numbers and dodgy accounting, and the true reality of these costs is frightening for all to see. 'We are now bound by treaty to both pay for the indignity of the surrender, and to line Mauritius's own coffers – and the true cost of this 'surrender tax' to the British public now seems set to top an eyewatering £30 billion.' On Friday, Penny Mordaunt, the former defence secretary, said the deal would help China 's ambitions. 'In atoning for our colonial 'wrongs of the past' Labour have enabled China's colonial future,' she posted online. 'The Chagos Islands 'deal' does not secure the base and it will impact military operations… It restricts where we can place maritime installations such as sensors, it requires we share our defence planning with Mauritius, it raises confusion over who will manage the electromagnetic spectrum. 'In trying to resolve a minor problem in the FCDO's in-tray they have created much greater ones both the immediate and long term.' Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former Tory leader, said: 'This is a terrible agreement. Future operations will be in jeopardy and Mauritius will be able to interfere. A weak agreement from a weak government.' A Downing Street source said the figures had been signed off by the Government Actuary's Department. 'This deal is vital for our security and is opposed only by Russia, China, Iran and the Conservatives,' the source said.
The Independent
23-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
This baffling Chagos deal will forever haunt Keir Starmer
I admit I am prejudiced. I tend to assume that politicians are trying to do the right thing. If only because being seen to do the right thing is usually the best way to advance their career. So when a politician is attacked for making what seems to be the wrong decision, I try to understand the trade-offs that led them to conclude that it was the least bad option. Even if I don't agree with their decision in the end, I think it is better to understand why they made it, rather than simply denouncing them as malign or stupid. That said, the decision to pay Mauritius to take over the Chagos Islands has me stumped. There must be good reasons for doing this deal, but nobody has been able to explain what they are. The Conservative government started the negotiations with Mauritius. James Cleverly as foreign secretary suspended talks, possibly because he couldn't see the prospect of a deal that he could sell to the British people, but David Cameron, his successor, started them again. When Keir Starmer became prime minister, he appointed Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair's former chief of staff and an experienced international deal-maker, to negotiate. Powell concluded a deal, and was later appointed the government's national security adviser. Cleverly, Cameron and Powell are no fools, and yet the deal they have ended up with looks foolish. Starmer cannot explain it. His speech on Thursday said that a ruling by the International Court of Justice that the islands belong to Mauritius would 'undermine the operation' of the US military base on Diego Garcia, which is important for British national security. The ICJ has already issued an advisory opinion to that effect, and Starmer said that there was no 'realistic prospect' of blocking a definitive ruling. Mauritius's claim is weak: the Chagos islands have never been part of its territory; but the politics of UN bodies such as the ICJ is strong. As the ICJ has no powers of enforcement, however, Britain could ignore the judgment. But Starmer said: 'If we do not agree this deal, the legal situation would mean that we would not be able to prevent China or any other nation setting up their own bases on the outer islands.' That sounds like the sort of far-fetched scenario dreamt up to try to justify a decision already taken on other grounds. Then there is the cost. In other circumstances, ceding the islands and leasing back the military base might be a sensible deal. If the islands had been seized from an indigenous people, and those people were now an independent nation and wanted it back, for example. But they weren't. They were uninhabited when the Europeans arrived. The 1,000 Chagossians, workers imported mostly from Africa and India who were displaced in the 1960s and 1970s to make way for the base, have been badly treated. This deal includes a £40m fund for them, but the main beneficiary is the government of Mauritius, which has no claim to Chagos except that the two island groups were administered together by the British. Mauritius's leaders portray themselves as righteous against a former 'colonial' power – yet their only claim to Chagos is that it was administered by the same colonial power. Starmer was reduced to arithmetical gibberish when questioned about the cost of the deal. He said the 'average' is £101m a year, but that the total over the 99-year lease was £3.4bn. He described this as a 'net cost', which is not right: it is a fancy formula for assessing long-term projects because people value nearer-term spending more than spending after they are dead. The common-sense valuation in today's money is £10bn, and we should ignore the Tory figure of £30bn, the total cash figure, which is even less numerically literate than the prime minister's. But it doesn't matter. The annual amount would be modest in the context of the national finances if it was justified. But it is not, so any amount is outrageous. This is a deal that will weigh Starmer down for the rest of his time in politics. It is like Gordon Brown 'selling the gold'. Actually, it is worse, because selling the gold was a sensible decision: the government should not be speculating in precious metals on behalf of citizens – it was simply bad luck that the price went up afterwards. The Chagos deal, though, looks like a bad deal, and nothing Starmer can say can persuade people otherwise. This month, the prime minister has secured four international deals. The trade deals with India, the US and the EU were triumphs in the national interest that will make us better off; but they will be overshadowed by an indefensible deal with Mauritius.
Telegraph
23-05-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Trump ‘laughing' at Starmer's Chagos deal, claims Badenoch
Donald Trump is 'laughing' at Sir Keir Starmer's deal to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, Kemi Badenoch has claimed. The Tory leader said the US president had 'got a great deal at the expense of the UK ' because Britain will meet the cost of the lease to maintain control of the vital Diego Garcia military base. Sir Keir claimed the deal would cost £101 million annually, amounting to £3.4 billion over 99 years. However, the true cost will probably exceed £30 billion in cash terms because of rising inflation and additional schemes to fund development projects in Mauritius. The military base is used by both the UK and the US and while the former will pay for the lease, the latter will continue to cover operating costs. Mrs Badenoch has labelled the deal with Mauritius 'wasteful' and 'dangerous' and on Friday morning she said it had ' not been done in our national interests '. She told the BBC Breakfast programme: 'Our country is getting poorer and it is getting weaker because of the decisions that Labour is making. 'Donald Trump is laughing at that Chagos deal, he is welcoming it, because he is not going to have to pay very much, if anything at all. 'He has got a great deal at the expense of the UK. That is not right. It hasn't been done in our national interests.' Meanwhile, Boris Johnson said the 'Chagos surrender is beyond belief'. He posted on X: 'Why are we paying a foreign country up to £30bn to take an asset that belongs to Britain? Why are we damaging our long-term national security? Starmer looks like a man with a bizarre and pointless fetish for self-mutilation.' The White House has expressed support for the deal. Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, said the agreement 'secures the long-term, stable and effective operation of the joint US-UK military facility at Diego Garcia, which is critical to regional and global security'. Luke Pollard, the UK's armed forces minister, said the US actually pays 'many multiples more' to operate the base than Britain will pay to Mauritius to maintain control of it. Asked why the US was not contributing to the cost of leasing back the base, Mr Pollard told Times Radio: 'What we are bringing to the deal is the real estate, the UK will be leasing the base and the Americans pay for the operating costs of the base – now that is many multiples more than the leasing cost.' Mr Pollard rejected a claim made by the Tories that Sir Keir had used 'dodgy accounting' when presenting the cost of the deal. He told Sky News: 'No. That is not right. It is £3.4 billion rather than the figure that you gave there. And it is calculated using the Treasury's rules and has been verified by the Government Actuary's Department and this is exactly the same way we calculate other long term costs such as pensions, investments in infrastructure or nuclear decommissioning. 'So it is £3.4 billion over 99 years. That represents good value and it is also comparable to other allies leasing bases in the region.' Ministers argued the deal needed to be done because the UK would have faced legal challenges 'within weeks' which could have jeopardised the operation of the Indian Ocean base.
Telegraph
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
The Chagossian woman who brought Starmer's deal to a standstill
Bertrice Pompe had barely been asleep for two hours when she woke to a phone call at 6am on Thursday. It was her friend Bernadette Dugasse – her sister in arms in the fight to block the Government's deal to surrender the Chagos Islands, a British territory, to Mauritius. 'She said 'get up, there's [going to be] a court case'.' Pompe, 54, had been on the phone to her lawyers throughout the night as a frantic, eleventh-hour battle to secure an emergency injunction from the court played out. At 2:25am, after five hours of legal argument, Mr Justice Goose issued the injunction, preventing Sir Keir Starmer from signing the deal in the morning. It came after 24 hours of chaos. The legal team representing Pompe only became aware of Starmer's plan to attend a 'virtual signing ceremony' with the Mauritian government on Thursday morning after it was leaked to the press on Tuesday night. After The Telegraph confirmed the story on Wednesday, they were left with just hours to intervene. 'After that news, then everything was rushed,' says Pompe, speaking after the hearing. 'My lawyer was on the phone with me almost all day, all night. I slept for two hours... They were on the phone with the judge for three hours last night.' A little before 3am, it seemed they had done it. 'When my lawyer [called] me last night, he said 'we're done',' says Pompe. '[He said] 'it looks like we've put [the signing] off for a little bit, because it was supposed to happen at 9am'. But he didn't say there was going to be a hearing.' An order issued overnight set a further hearing for 10.30am and Pompe raced into town from her home in Clapham to be there in time. In a packed courtroom, Philip Rule KC, representing her, appeared on a TV screen. He made his apologies for appearing via video link and for his 'attire'. He was speaking from a hotel room in New York, where it was still the middle of the night, and lacked the customary black gown and wig so appeared in a white shirt. 'This was the only outfit I had with me that came close to fitting the bill.' And so, the 90 minutes that would decide the fate of the Chagos Islands began. The judge, Mr Justice Chamberlain, heard from Rule that the signing should be put off in order to prevent 'significant prejudice to the claimant', who has always argued the deal would make it harder for Chagossians to return to the islands of their birth. Chagossians were removed from the islands between the 1960s and 1970s – largely to Mauritius – to make way for the UK-US military base on Diego Garcia, where Pompe was born. Pompe's parents moved to the Seychelles six months after her birth in 1971. 'They were told they have to leave. They're not going to be given work, they're not going to be given food, there's no salary.' Pompe has accused the Mauritian government of being 'racist' towards Chagossians, and deems the deal to be a breach of her human rights. She says the UK Government failed to carry out a 'lawful consultation' of Chagossians living in the UK, and failed to 'properly consider' all manner of issues, from rights of residence to 'cultural heritage, and the community's expressed wishes'. Chagossians have never, she has always argued, been consulted adequately on a deal that impacts them so personally. The Conservative government entered into bilateral negotiations with Mauritius, but nothing had been concluded ahead of the general election, after which Starmer decided to press ahead and give the islands away. Critics, including the Tories and Reform UK (the deputy leader of which, Richard Tice, was present in court), say military assets on Diego Garcia will be at risk due to the close ties between Mauritius and China. The UK Government – backed by President Trump and US intelligence agencies – will now lease back the military base on the island at great expense to the taxpayer (it is expected to cost £10 billion in lease payments over 99 years). It claims it is the only way to secure the 'long-term future' of a base which is crucial to national security. For Pompe, who moved to Britain 22 years ago, it is significantly more personal. 'This new Government just jumped in and wants to disrupt everything,' she says. '[They want to] just accept the deal, and don't care about what happens even to British people who were born in Britain,' referring to the impact that the costly deal might have on public finances. ' They want to cut down on taking care of elderly people to give money to Mauritius. How can you accept that? I think more British people should be backing us. Because it's going to affect them as well.' Pompe, a fashion designer, has twin daughters who are now in their twenties. Five years ago, she was diagnosed with fibromyalgia which causes her daily discomfort and fatigue. Ultimately, Starmer's response to the spanner thrown in the works by a softly spoken mother-of-two was to send for Sir James Eadie, Whitehall's most senior lawyer, known as the 'Treasury Devil'. Eadie told the court it had no power to stand in the way of international relations and foreign policy decision making. 'My instructions from Number 10 are that we need a decision by 1pm today and that everyone is standing by,' he said. He told the court 'damage has already been done' in delaying the signing, arguing, 'There is jeopardy to international relations.' Just 20 minutes before the Government's deadline, the judge declared there should be no further interim relief and the stay should be lifted. 'The order is discharged. If you want to... you'll have to go to the Court of Appeal.' Pompe sat among a small group of campaigners, including three little girls sitting patiently with their parents, who represented a whole community. Trying to 'understand what the judge was saying', she found herself thinking about these girls who have little idea of the islands some 6,000 miles away where their ancestors came from. Speaking at a coffee shop near the court after the hearing, she says that she has a ten-year-old grandson who has little sense of his Chagossian heritage 'because all this is dying'. Pompe, dressed in black, looks exhausted. It is a deeply disappointing ending to what has been a long, personal struggle. The case has been the work of a large legal team and an even bigger campaign group, but as the woman chosen by her fellow campaigners to represent their cause, it is her name on the court paperwork. Why did she feel compelled to lead the charge? 'I'm a native. Most of those people who came today to see us, most of the people in our community, they are descendants. The natives are dying out.' Pompe says her parents didn't talk much about the homeland they had been forced to leave. Life in the Seychelles was not so very different than it would have been on Chagos – 'it's still island life', she says – but they were 'discriminated against' there. 'Even our ID card that we get from the Seychelles government is different, I think to isolate us. As soon as you look at the ID number you will know – she wasn't born here.' Pompe would like the chance to return to the place where she was born. In signing this agreement, she feels Starmer has put paid to that chance. 'Keir Starmer doesn't care,' she says. 'I bet he doesn't know anything about Chagossians. He probably doesn't know much about Diego Garcia either. They keep talking – even in court, even in the US – about how important Diego Garcia is to us, to our security. It's important to us as well but you never hear them say that.' The court heard how Pompe told the Government in March that she was considering legal action. Through the course of the hearing, the judge repeatedly questioned the delay in Pompe issuing formal proceedings. 'I knew something was going to go wrong because he kept saying the same thing? Why did we leave that big delay?' she says. Her lawyer explained that a delay in applying for legal aid had been behind it, the recent cyber attack on the Legal Aid Agency having slowed down attempts to get crucial funding. Over the past three months, there has been 'obstacle after obstacle', says Pompe. 'I don't know why the judge wouldn't understand. Maybe he's never been poor. He said we could have done this at any time – no we couldn't. We've been asking for donations, opening GoFundMe pages. It didn't work.' After the hearing, one campaigner, Jemmy Simon, said the Government 'are not treating us like we are human beings'. 'We are British citizens but our rights do not count.' 'British justice takes care of who they want, when they want. They haven't been able to rectify the wrongs they have done to us.' Pompe dreams of one day returning to Chagos, to the 'blue sea, the sun, the coconuts'. In the meantime she is proud, at least, of having done her bit to delay the signing. 'The lawyer said we should [feel proud], because if we didn't bring that, even though it's in a rush, there wouldn't be press, it would have gone quietly, just the way they wanted it to. 'Now it is like we are muddying the water, and they don't like that.'
Telegraph
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Starmer's Chagos deal can go ahead
Sir Keir Starmer's deal to give away the Chagos islands to Mauritius can go ahead, a judge has ruled, after a last-minute legal challenge failed. Mr Justice Chamberlain ruled at the High Court on Thursday that the Government should not be stopped from signing the deal with Mauritius. Campaigners brought legal action against the Foreign Office on Wednesday evening and won an emergency injunction from the court in the middle of the night. Bertrice Pompe, who was born on the Chagos Islands, claimed that the deal is a breach of her human rights and asked for time to launch a judicial review. On Thursday morning, Philip Rule KC, representing Ms Pompe, asked the judge for the injunction to continue, to prevent 'significant prejudice to the claimant'. But the Government, represented by the 'Treasury Devil' Sir James Eadie, argued that the courts have no power to block foreign policymaking. The deal is now set to be signed by Sir Keir, before MPs rise for a ten-day parliamentary recess. The decision comes after a night of legal drama at the High Court, where campaigners brought an 11th-hour action against the Government's plans to sign the deal with Mauritius on Thursday. On Wednesday night, The Telegraph reported that the long-awaited deal was going ahead and that Sir Keir Starmer would attend a 'virtual signing ceremony' with the Mauritian government at 10.30am. After five hours of legal argument, at 2.25am, Mr Justice Goose issued an emergency injunction preventing the deal from going ahead. His ruling said ministers 'shall take no conclusive or legally binding step to conclude its negotiations concerning the possible transfer of the British Indian Ocean Territory (also known as the Chagos Archipelago) to a foreign government or bind itself as to the particular terms of any such transfer'. It follows years of debate about the sovereignty of the Chagos Islands, which began under the last Conservative government. In 2019, the International Court of Justice decided that the islands should belong to Mauritius, which was given independence from the UK in 1968. The tiny island chain in the centre of the Indian Ocean was retained by Britain and served as the location for a strategic military base, Diego Garcia. The base is shared with the US government and was used for bombing runs into the Middle East after 9/11. However, critics argue that the islands should also have been given up by the UK, and launched a 'decolonisation' attempt in the international courts. They also point to the forced expulsion of Chagossians from the islands to make way for the military base in the 1960s, for which the UK has since apologised. Although the court ruling in 2019 was not binding, the UK Government became concerned that legal uncertainty about the base would make it harder for the British and American militaries to operate there. The Conservative government entered into bilateral negotiations with Mauritius, but did not conclude them before last year's general election, when Sir Keir decided to press ahead with a deal to give them away. Opponents of the deal, including the Conservatives and Reform UK, say it will endanger the military assets on Diego Garcia, much of which are secret and held at a high security classification by the Ministry of Defence. Mauritius has come under scrutiny for its diplomatic ties with China, Russia and Iran, which critics of the deal say could build spying installations on islands close to the military base. The UK government says that an agreement to give away the islands, then lease back the military base, is the only way to secure its 'long-term future'. That argument has been backed by Donald Trump and US intelligence agencies, who signed off a deal after Sir Keir's visit to the White House in February. The terms of the deal, which have not been made public, will include billions of pounds in lease payments by the UK to Mauritius over 99 years. The Telegraph understands the new Mauritian government, elected in November, has also secured a package of development funding and a new scheme to help native people of the Chagos Islands, whose families were displaced in the 1960s to return there. But some Chagossians living in the UK say they were not consulted on the deal.
