Attack of the Establishment: All Living UK Former Prime Ministers Demand Continued Foreign Aid Spending

Five former globalism-backing prime ministers are putting pressure on Boris Johnson to ditch plans to lower the UK’s aid commitment to divert taxpayer money back into the country to counteract the devastation to the British economy caused by the Chinese coronavirus.

It was under Tory David Cameron’s rule that Britain became legally obliged to spend 0.7 per cent of GDP on foreign aid, which was followed by years of reports of misspending of British taxpayers’ money. Cameron had enacted the measures into law in 2015, but it was the fulfilment of the pledge by Tony Blair ten years earlier, based on the target set by the United Nations.

The pledge was retained by his Conservative successors Theresa May and Boris Johnson. But last week, reports circulated that Prime Minister Johnson is considering a temporary cut to 0.5 per cent until 2022 to offset the economic damage of the Wuhan virus.

Since then, the establishment’s former premiers have come out to oppose the plans to alleviate the burden on the beleaguered British people, favouring continued generosity to foreign nations.

Sir John Major, the Conservative who was implicated in the downfall of his predecessor Margaret Thatcher, told The Times on Tuesday that cutting foreign aid was “morally wrong and politically unwise” and claimed the move “damages our soft power” in the world.

“I cannot and do not support it,” said the avid Europhile, who backed the Remain campaign in the 2016 EU membership referendum and has persistently attacked Brexit since.

David Cameron, the Remainer who walked out of the premiership after losing the referendum, and Tony Blair, another Remainer famous for his involvement in the invasion of Iraq and his domestic open borders policies that saw immigration swell at the beginning of the millennium, issued a joint statement last week to condemn the plans.

Both complained that the move would risk “alienating” media-crowned Joe Biden at the next G7 summit to be held in the UK in 2021. However, Anglo-American relations under a presumed Biden presidency would already be soured, with the Democrat’s contempt for Britain recently displayed over his position on Brexit and by snubbing the nation’s broadcaster by refusing to speak to the BBC, claiming: “I’m Irish.”

Mr Cameron also told The Telegraph that prioritising Britons suffering from the fallout of lockdown over “the world’s poorest” would be a “moral” mistake. Mr Blair claimed that giving over billions to nations without meaningful oversight “isn’t about charity. It’s enlightened self-interest.” Blair went on to imply that if the UK cut foreign aid to help its own, it would further destabilise already volatile parts of the world, contributing to mass illegal migration, extremism, and the spread of coronavirus.

Theresa May, the Remain-voting Tory who twice delayed Brexit over parliament’s refusal to pass her soft deal with the EU, is also said to have privately told colleagues she is opposed to the plans.

While Blair’s successor Gordon Brown — who during a hot-mic moment called a senior Briton concerned about immigration a “bigoted woman”, effectively killing the left-wing movement, and widely seen as the first domino to fall in the EU membership debate — again worried about the impact on Britain’s ability to virtue signal around the world.

“If we break these promises, we’re not just breaking promises within our own country, we’re breaking promises that will destroy our reputation across the world,” Mr Brown told Sky News last week.

The Daily Mail in partnership with pressure group the Taxpayers’ Alliance revealed that the UK had given £81 million of Britons’ money in foreign aid to communist China — the world’s second-largest economy and the originator of the coronavirus pandemic.