Letter: Council Leader Answers Questions on Any Links to Russian Wisley Investors

Published on: 4 Mar, 2019
Updated on: 5 Mar, 2019

Sir Paul Beresford MP and Cllr Paul Spooner

From David Roberts

Guildford council leader Paul Spooner has given definitive answers to three questions I put to him in The Dragon in January about the proposed development at Three Farms Meadows, also known as “Wisley airfield” (see Letter: Why Does Cllr Spooner Not Give Clear Answers?)

The questions were:

• Does he know the identity of the anonymous Russian or other investors in the Wisley Investment Group (WIG)?
• Has he ever discussed local planning issues during a private or other visit to Russia?
• Have his Russian relatives or contacts ever been involved with WIG or Cllr Mike Murray’s promotion of Three Farms Meadows?

The questions were prompted by an inconclusive spat between Cllr Spooner and Sir Paul Beresford MP over remarks about the project made by the latter in Parliament.

Cllr Spooner, whose wife is of Russian origin, did not reply to The Dragon letter, but in response to a Freedom of Information request, a senior Guildford Council officer has answered: ‘”I have spoken to Cllr Spooner and his response to each of your questions is No”.

I am relieved by this reply, which I am pleased to place on the public record.  I have no doubt Cllr Spooner is telling the truth. But I wonder why he did not volunteer this information at the outset, instead of attacking public interest in the subject as “unsavoury”.

Councillors perhaps need to learn that the world does not revolve around their reputations.  In this instance, the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee has reported: “The use of London as a base for the corrupt assets of Kremlin-connected individuals is now clearly linked to a wider Russian strategy and has implications for our national security.”

Guildford residents are therefore right, like Sir Paul, to be concerned about secret Russian involvement in a major local project.  It is no less disturbing that the project’s frontman is a leading Conservative councillor from Oxfordshire.

Councillor Spooner declined to comment on this letter.

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