Brexiter questioned about where his £9m of backing for leave campaign came from

Arron Banks has told MPs he thought it would be worthwhile meeting a Russian businessman fronting a goldmining deal, at the suggestion of the country’s ambassador to the UK, and only pulled out after being warned not to become more deeply involved.

Banks told the digital, culture, media and sport select committee he reasoned it was worth attending the initial meeting with Siman Povarenkin, but was then advised to “be circumspect” about further involvement by the former chief of the general staff Lord Guthrie and the businessman Peter Hambro.

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“I met with him, I’m a businessman, why shouldn’t I? I thought it was interesting,” Banks said. After the warnings, he added, the deal fell away. “I have no business in Russia, I have done no business deals in Russia.”

Questions about the Brexit donor’s engagement with the deal came towards the end of an often tense three-hour hearing, that came days after a leaked cache of emails from Banks suggested his contacts with Russian officials in the UK were deeper than thought.

Banks eventually walked out of the hearing, refusing to answer five more minutes of questions because he had a lunch with the Democratic Unionist party MPs Ian Paisley Jr and Sammy Wilson and had previously been told the proceedings were close to a conclusion.

Appearing alongside the Leave.EU communications director, Andy Wigmore, Banks also denied visiting Russia in February 2016 to progress the mining deal as the leak had suggested, and he presented the committee with copies of both of his passports, which he said showed there was no visa stamp around that date.

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The two witnesses said that when Wigmore had emailed a journalist at the time to suggest Banks was in Russia and unavailable, he was being mischievous and lying.

At another point, Banks said it was not uncommon for he and Wigmore to exaggerate to try to gain an advantage with plausible stories. “We certainly weren’t afraid of leading journalists up the country path, the same with politicians,” he said. “Journalists are the cleverest, stupidest people on earth. They are clever, but they want to believe some of this stuff.”

After the hearing, the committee chairman, Damian Collins, said: “Banks and Wigmore themselves put on the record that they frequently lie, exaggerate, misspeak and misunderstand. So it is difficult for the committee to know if we should take all of their answers seriously when it comes to data sharing and misuse, campaign spending, and their meetings with high-ranking Russian officials.”

The suggestion that Banks meet Povarenkin followed a meeting with Russia’s ambassador to the UK, Alexander Yakovenko, in November 2015. Banks told MPs he went to meet him because he had been invited at the prompting of Wigmore, who also acted as a trade envoy for Belize.



Giles Watling, a Conservative MP on the committee, asked Banks: “I’d like to move on to big, scary Russia. I get the point that if the Russian ambassador asks you round for a drink you go, but this relationship went on for quite some time. What were you hoping to get out of it?”

Banks initially replied: “A good lunch, and that’s what I got.” This prompted Watling to ask if there were in fact “many good lunches”, to which Banks said: “Many good lunches.”

He had previously said in the book The Bad Boys of Brexit that he attended one “six-hour boozy lunch” with the Russian ambassador in November 2015, several months before the Brexit vote, at which they drank vodka supposedly distilled for Joseph Stalin.

Banks and Wigmore also told MPs they had passed a phone number for the Trump transition team to Yakovenko at another lunch they had with him in November 2016, a few days after their visit to Trump Tower when they met the then president-elect after waiting in the building for six hours. “What’s wrong with that? We gave them a telephone number,” Banks said.

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The committee heard Wigmore had obtained the number after he supplied one for No 10 to a receptionist for Donald Trump. According to Wigmore, she said: “You’re British, do you have the telephone number for No 10 Downing Street? We do not have [a] relationship with the British or any of these governments.”

He said he asked her “what if somebody wants to get in touch with you?” and she replied: “Here’s a number, you can give them that.”

Earlier it emerged Banks had lodged an appeal against the Electoral Commission over its decision to fine Leave.EU £70,000 for breaching spending limits. Collins told the committee that as a result it would not be possible for the MPs to explore related areas. The commission is also conducting a separate inquiry into the “true source” of Banks’ loans and donations to Leave.EU and Ukip, which amount to at least £9m.

The hearing began with an attempt by the two men to unbalance Collins by pointing out that according to the register of members’ interests he had received hospitality and two tickets from Roman Abramovich’s Chelsea to watch a game against Crystal Palace. “In the light of hospitality from Putin’s No 1 man in London, you might recuse yourself,” Wigmore said.

Collins told the witnesses it was a “nice try” but that although he had watched the match he had not met Abramovich. He went on to say he “wasn’t offered Stalin’s vodka” and had “no shares in goldmines”, and in response to a suggestion from Banks he added that there were “no honey traps”. The Conservative MP said: “Chelsea won 2-1, that was the extent of the entertainment.”