Researchers claimed that getting information from government departments about the Duke of York’s past business dealings is like playing ‘whack-a-mole’.Claims of refused FOI requests into Duke of York’s business dealings come as controversy over alleged Chinese spy continues.
Getting information from government departments about the Duke of York’s past business dealings is like playing “whack-a-mole”, it was claimed, as fallout over the alleged Chinese “spy” controversy continues, with China saying it was Calling for a register of royal interests, similar to that for MPs, and a full inquiry by the public accounts committee into royal finances, researchers trying to investigate Prince Andrew’s “opaque” finances claim their freedom of information (FoI) requests are regularly refused, making their work “impossible”., as the businessman and confidant of Prince Andrew who was excluded from the UK in 2023 on the grounds that it was “conducive to the public good”. Yangand the Chinese embassy in London has accused some UK parliamentarians of having a “twisted mentality towards China” and of trying to “smear China”.As the spotlight falls again on the duke’s finances, Andrew Lownie, whose book Entitled: The Controversial Lives of the Duke and Duchess of York is out next year, said: “I’ve put in about 100 FoI requests over the last four years.”Lownie said documents relating to Andrew’s decade as “special representative” for UK trade and investment, “when he was basically a public servant”, could reveal who went on his numerous overseas trips with him, who he met while on them, and what the purpose of them was.The duke then started his Dragons’ Den-style Pitch@Palace entrepreneur schem