The British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, yesterday challenged the Conservatives to establish their political independence from financial donors by promoting the pro-European former chancellor, Mr Kenneth Clarke.
Mr Cook threw down the political gauntlet after the betting entrepreneur, Mr Stuart Wheeler, who pledged £5 million to the Tories last week, told the Sunday Telegraph he was prepared to donate up to £5 million more but would withdraw financial support if Mr Clarke or another pro-European MP were elected leader.
When he emerged as the single largest donor to a British political party last week, Mr Wheeler had said he was not seeking any influence or favour. But the condition implicit in this latest offering raised questions about the influence of political donors and provided ammunition for Labour.
"I think that it is entirely wrong that any large donor should say to a party who it is prepared to see as spokespersons for that party," Mr Cook told GMTV's Morning Programme as he called on the Tory leader, Mr William Hague, to prove his independence and give Mr Clarke a high-profile role within the party.
"In a way, what he said does give William Hague the chance to prove that he is for real when he says that he's independent and not influenced by these donations," he said.
Mr Clarke's promotion would "do the Tory Party a lot of good," since he was "the most authoritative, senior, respected figure on the Tory benches.
"If he does not, it will lead to the suspicion that he is more influenced by the money than an evaluation of what Kenneth Clarke can bring to the Tory Party."
But the Conservative Party described reports that Mr Wheeler was seeking to apply conditions as "absolute nonsense".
The shadow cabinet office minister, Mr Andrew Lansley, insisted Mr Wheeler was not seeking political influence and party policy would remain unchanged whether he was donating £10 or £5 million. The Liberal Democrat leader, Mr Charles Kennedy, described the growth in large individual donations to political parties as a worrying development when he appeared on yesterday's BBC Breakfast with Frost programme.
"I think that once you are getting into the scale of individual donations that we have seen, that really does become offensive to a lot of people's sense of fair play," he said.
Raising serious doubts about the influence donors should have upon political parties, he added: "Should it be for wealthy tycoons to start dictating who becomes the democratically elected leaders of our parties? I don't think so."
Mr Wheeler is chairman and chief executive of the spread betting company, IG Index.