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Politics

04th Nov 2018

Remainer Twitter in meltdown over BBC Arron Banks interview

They are angry he's been given a 'platform'

Oli Dugmore

They are angry he’s been given a ‘platform’

Arron Banks is being investigated by the National Crime Agency. The Electoral Commission referred the case, about potential spending offences during the 2016 referendum campaign on EU membership, to the agency.

It suspected Banks was not the “true source” of loans to the campaign and the money had come “from impermissible sources” – noting several meetings with senior Russian officials about gold mining.

Arron Banks on the Andrew Marr Show

Banks, who calls himself a ‘bad boy of Brexit,’ has been the focus of intense speculation about the legality of anti-EU campaigning and the Brexit vote as whole. Vote Leave, the designated campaign during the referendum, has been proven to break spending rules.

Reporting for The Observer, Carole Cadwalladr is drawing connections between Banks, Russia and election manipulation by big data companies like Cambridge Analytica.

She, and many others, said the BBC should not be giving Banks a ‘platform’ by interviewing him.

https://twitter.com/lunar_lazarus/status/1059154566422380544

https://twitter.com/timolarch/status/1059144430320541697

https://twitter.com/EhhAveMaria/status/1059041271677939712

Rob Burley, editor of the BBC’s live political programming, defended the interview – as he regularly does to one side of the divide or the other, depending on who’s on.