Tory MP urges Cameron turn off ‘golden tap’ on ‘misused’ foreign aid to developing world

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London, Sep 18: A senior Tory party member has urged British Prime Minister David Cameron to stop ‘spraying around’ taxpayers’ money in countries belonging to the developing world.

Lord Ashcroft, who’s been made an adviser by Cameron, insisted that it is time for the latter to turn off the ‘golden tap’ on foreign aid, warning that London is just bankrolling corrupt dictators.

“I urge you to recommend to the Prime Minister to turn off the golden taps and stop flooding the developing world with our money,” the Daily Mail quoted Ashcroft, who was made a privy counsellor in last month’s reshuffle, as writing, in an open letter to new Development Secretary Justine Greening on the Conservative-home website.

The rebuke came after revelations that the UK Government’s burgeoning aid budget was funding ‘poverty barons’ who were raking in millions through their consultancies.

He urged Greening to rebuff the overtures of ‘self-aggrandising popstars and lobbying from self-interested groups’.

Ashcroft also suggested that the Department for International Development should be scrapped and returned to the Foreign Office fold, which had responsibility for aid before Tony Blair’s government came to power in 1997.

Earlier, it was revealed that the Department for International Development (DfID) had handed over the cash for work in countries, including Afghanistan, Nepal and India.

It also emerged that some consultants are even being paid seven-figure salaries for help with DfID-funded projects and the department is funding dozens of consultancy firms, handing over up to six million pounds a time.

The payments come as other government departments that fund projects in the UK are being forced to scale back spending. Critics have slammed the UK Government for this, saying the spending was a waste of taxpayers’ cash. (ANI)