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Founder of Leave.EU tells BBC money came from his own bank account

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Arron Banks has insisted there was was “no Russian money, no interference” in the £8m he gave to the unofficial Brexit campaign, but refused to disclose which of his companies had generated the cash.

The founder of Leave.EU, whom the Electoral Commission referred to the National Crime Agency (NCA), said he wanted to state “absolutely for the record, there was no Russian money or interference of any type, I just want to be absolutely clear about that”.

The Electoral Commission’s review of referendum finances focused on £2m loaned by Banks and his insurance companies to Better for the Country, the parent company of Leave.EU, and a £6m donation that he made alone.

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Banks was referred to the NCA after it found evidence to suspect the funds came from Rock Holdings, owned by Banks and based in the Isle of Man. The company is offshore and thus barred from donating.

Banks, appearing on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show on Sunday, claimed the money came from his UK company Rock Services, and said it was generated by his group of insurance businesses.

“The money came from Rock Services, which was a UK limited company. It was generated out of insurance business written in the UK,” Banks said. “Contrary to some of the press reports … we turn over £250m of premium, it’s a sizeable business.”

Banks has previously said his company Rock Services did not generate income. He told the digital, culture, media and sport select committee that it was “a treasury function, it just delivers the cash ... It is just a service company. The actual loan came from another one of my companies that was delivered in.”

The EC has said it has “reasonable grounds to suspect that Rock Services did not fund the payments of £8m”.

When Marr put it to Banks that Rock Services was a “shell company ... which doesn’t generate that kind of money”, Banks said the income came from insurance profits and was “UK-generated”.

However, he refused to say which of his companies had generated the income for Rock Services. “It has all sorts of revenue … it’s a group of companies,” Banks said. “Your understanding of it is wrong. [The donations] came from me – I am Rock Services, the companies belong to me and I am a UK taxpayer.”

Later on Twitter, Banks was defiant about his refusal to name how the income for Rock Services was generated. “Just remind me, if the money came from the UK companies & myself, why should I explain anyway?” he tweeted. “I’ve been very open.”

Banks said he had provided bank statements from Rock Holdings to The Andrew Marr Show, though Marr said they had been redacted, and that no money came from the Isle of Man-based company, which owns both UK-based and international businesses.

Banks said the EC had not asked for his bank statements and that a QC had signed off the loan structure for the donation.

“We know what this is about – it’s about undermining article 50 and the Brexit result,” he said. “It’s a group of vicious MPs who have grouped together with the Guardian and the FT.”

The NCA announced last week that it was investigating allegations of criminal offences by Banks and Leave.EU. The businessman said the NCA would “see it for what it is” and suggested he would be vindicated.

Banks also said he stood by a comment in the Sunday Times this week that he would now vote to remain in the EU, blaming “corruption” in British politics.

“The sewer that exists, the disgraceful behaviour of the government in how they are selling us out means that if I had my time again, I think we would have been better to probably remain and not unleash these demons,” he said.

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Banks’s appearance on the show came after it emerged he may have misled parliament over links between his pro-Brexit campaign and his insurance business during the EU referendum.

Hundreds of internal emails leaked by former employees from Eldon Insurance and Rock Services to the Observer suggest that – despite categorical denials by Banks – insurance staff worked on the Leave.EU campaign from their company offices.

Any work carried out in the months before the referendum should have been declared under electoral law.

Banks said it had been declared and that people from Eldon had “transferred over on short-term contracts, legally, and it was reported in the right way”.

On Tuesday, the information commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, will announce the outcome of an inquiry into claims Eldon potentially broke data protection law by sharing customer data obtained for insurance purposes with Leave.EU.

The BBC’s decision to interview Banks on its flagship politics show provoked widespread condemnation beforehand from remain-backing politicians and activists.

Andrew Adonis, a Labour peer, said in a letter to the BBC that Banks’s appearance was the result of “a very serious editorial misjudgment, influenced by a culture of accommodation to extreme Brexiteers now deeply embedded within the BBC”.

In a statement before the interview, the BBC said: “There is a strong public interest in an interview with Arron Banks about allegations of funding irregularities in relation to Leave.EU and the 2016 EU referendum.”