In the Guardian today:

Transparency campaigners have called for thinktanks to be more open about their funding sources, after it emerged that some of Britain’s most influential ones received more than $1m (£787,000) from from donations in the US in 2021.

They include the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), regarded as an inspiration for policies adopted by the Liz Truss government, and Policy Exchange – a conservative thinktank used as a platform by ministers to trail new measures and which recently incubated hardline immigration plans.

The IEA’s US wing, American Friends of the Institute of Economic Affairs (AFIEA), has accepted $118,000 since 2020 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation [Trump connection at foot of this post], a private foundation set up by the billionaire libertarian heir to an oil and banking dynasty.

The IEA is believed to have inspired many of the free-market policies pursued by Truss and the then-chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng. Some of her staff worked at the IEA, and she founded its political wing, Freer. Truss spoke at more of its events than “any other politician over the past 12 years” according to the head of the IEA.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/aug/04/uk-thinktanks-urged-to-be-transparent-about-funding-as-1m-us-donations-revealed

The dark deeds of the IEA are well known to TuS.

In August 2021:

In the Guardian then:

The Institute of Economic Affairs has lost a two-year battle with LBC radio presenter James O’Brien over claims the registered charity is a politically motivated lobbying organisation funded by “dark money”.

The IEA complained to media regulator Ofcom that the radio station had made a series of inaccurate and unfair suggestions that the organisation is a professional lobby group of “questionable provenance, with dubious ideas and validity” staffed by people who are not proper experts on their topic.https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/aug/09/lbcs-james-obrien-wins-ofcom-battle-with-institute-of-economic-affairs

There is no mention of the IEA’s activity with regard to the campaign for Scottish independence but they have featured many times and notably since 2014, working to undermine the case with fake information.

In 2014 they suggested:

There are many unknowns on matters like currency, North Sea oil, national debt, EU membership and so on, but one consequence of a Scottish yes vote is certain: Other things equal, in order to maintain the current standard of healthcare, the Scottish tax burden would have to rise considerably. In 2006, per capita healthcare spending in Scotland was almost £300 p.a. above English levels, a gap which can only have increased in the meantime. After a secession, the bill for this extra spending could no longer be sent to London; it would have to be fully paid out of Scottish taxes.https://iea.org.uk/blog/healthcare-in-scotland-careful-what-you-wish-for-%E2%80%98yes%E2%80%99-campaigners

In 2016, they argued:

Scotland’s First Minister is now trying to take Scotland out of the UK because more Scottish people voted to remain in the EU than they did to leave – but there is something very wrong about this. A two-million-people majority voted in the Scottish independence referendum in 2014 to go the same way as the UK. These votes are not simply wiped out by the fact that Scotland, like many constituent parts of the UK, did not on their own vote for Brexit.

https://iea.org.uk/blog/no-young-people-were-not-robbed-of-our-future

Good Morning Scotland made a case for failure in Scotland’s minimum pricing of alcohol strategy based on their selective calculations:

Good Morning Scotland allows disreputable alcohol-funded lobbyists to undermine SNP minimum pricing policy

They are alcohol-industry-funded but GMS did not mention this.

https://www.bmj.com/content/348/bmj.g1572/rr/688516

In April 2020, the Herald’s Tom Gordon used their arguments to attack the First Minister’s support for Universal Basic Income:https://talkingupscotlandtwo.com/2020/04/11/likeminded-heralds-tom-gordonstoun-and-ieas-kate-andrews/embed/#?secret=NaLrb7wL8Z

In 2019, I wrote at greater length on the IEA:

As the IEA gets a doing today, remember Reporting Scotland’s fondness for such ‘independent’ think-tanks in 2014?

On BBC Politics Live today, Mark Little, Director General of the Institute of Economic Affairs looked as if he might burst a blood vessel as their interviewer pushed him to reveal who funds the IEA. They showed secret film of him boasting of his access to politicians and evidence of donations from the extreme right in the USA. Another two men representing The Taxpayer’s Alliance and the Academy of Ideas promptly went beetroot-red too. Hiding something gentlemen?

It’s worth a watch: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0002p7k/politics-live-19022019

As I watched, my mind returned to 2014 when Reporting Scotland made regular use of research reports of variable reliability often from ‘independent’ thinktanks, to undermine the case for Scottish independence. In the year from 17th September 2012 to 18th September 2013, they used such sources to attack independence 22 times while only reporting 4 times on research favourable to it.

http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.com/repository/FairnessInTheFirstYear.pdf

Then in the four months before UK General Election of 2015, they used such reports to undermine the case for independence 36 times with none supporting it.

Click to access propaganda-or-professionalism.pdf

To find where the IEA stands on Scottish independence requires no great research expertise. From their own site:

Scottish independence and the sterling-zone controversy

Healthcare in Scotland: Careful what you wish for, ‘Yes’ campaigners

Against subsidised home rule: Why Scotland should pay for its own healthcare

In further evidence of their impartiality, the previous DG of the IEA, John Blundell, campaigned for the privatisation of Scottish water and predicted the death of Scottish farming in the EU:

https://iea.org.uk/in-the-media/media-coverage/scots-and-water-0

https://iea.org.uk/in-the-media/media-coverage/will-the-new-eu-members-end-farming-in-scotland-0

To finish, here’s Mark in 2014 on how the English model for health provision could improve things in Scotland:

‘Allowing complete freedom of choice and empowering people to choose private commissioners and providers will promote competition across the health sector. This will see hospitals, as well as GP surgeries and commissioning groups, competing to look after the health care of all Britons, as their livelihood will depend on it.’

The IEA’s paper argued that the health services in Scotland have suffered as a result of not introducing the type of market reforms pioneered by Labour in England.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/people-opt-out-nhs-tax-rebate-8024973

Finally, the Trump connection:

In 2017 the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that “at least 25 high-ranking members” of President Donald trump’s transition team were connected to organizations funded by the Scaife Foundation. These included two Cabinet members:  Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao had been a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis was a fellow at the Hoover Institution. Two Scaife Foundation trustees, Heritage Foundation chair Edwin J. Feulner and Republican National Committeewoman Christine Jack Toretti, had also been members of Trump’s transition team.

https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/sarah-scaife-foundation/