Labour’s anti-corruption minister Tulip Siddiq has referred herself to a watchdog and cancelled an upcoming trip to China amid questions over her property interests.
The Hampstead and Highgate MP will be probed by Sir Laurie Magnus, the independent adviser on ministerial standards, about her use of homes linked to her aunt.
Ms Siddiq, the niece of recently-deposed Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina, is under pressure over her links to the ousted regime in the Asian country.
She used a flat in Hampstead, north London, after it was gifted to her teenage sister by an ally of the Awami League party.
Moin Ghani, a Bangladeshi lawyer who has represented Hasina’s government, was reported to be the generous donor.
It also emerged that Ms Siddiq was given a flat in King’s Cross by another associate of senior Awami League members.
Asked if Ms Siddiq should be transparent about her use of properties linked to her aunt, Sir Keir Starmer revealed she had referred herself to Sir Laurie.
But the Prime Minister also offered his full backing to the Labour minister.
‘Tulip Siddiq has acted entirely properly by referring herself to the independent adviser, as she has now done,’ Sir Keir said this morning, as he took media questions following a speech on NHS reform.
‘That’s why we brought into being the new code, it’s to allow ministers to ask the adviser to establish the facts.
‘Yes I’ve got confidence in her and that’s the process that will now be happening.’
Hasina stands accused by the new Bangladeshi administration of ‘massacres, killings and crimes against humanity’, including the deaths of at least 800 protesters.
She is also accused of corruption and embezzlement, with her rule ending in self-imposed exile last August following an uprising.
Sir Keir, who is a neighbouring MP to Ms Siddiq as well as a close friend, was reported to have visited Hasina while he was a backbencher.
The 2016 trip was funded by Labour Friends of Bangladesh – a group strongly associated with Ms Siddiq.
In 2022, he was pictured meeting her in London once he had become leader of the Opposition.
Tory MP Matt Vickers, a shadow Home Office minister, said: ‘It is disappointing that Keir Starmer has allowed scandal in his Government to overshadow today’s announcement.
‘There are clear questions for his friend and anti-corruption minister Tulip Siddiq to answer about allegations made about her.
‘She must be held to the same standards as other ministers in his Government, indications so far show that that may not be the case.’
Ms Siddiq insisted she had ‘done nothing wrong’ in a letter to Sir Laurie.
She said: ‘In recent weeks I have been the subject of media reporting, much of it inaccurate, about my financial affairs and my family’s links to the former government of Bangladesh.
‘I am clear that I have done nothing wrong. However, for the avoidance of doubt, I would like you to independently establish the facts about these matters.
‘I will obviously ensure you have all the information you need to do this.’
Ms Siddiq, the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, had been due to join a delegation heading to China this week, but will now stay in the UK as she fights to clear her name.
A source said: ‘Tulip wants to be the UK so she is available to assist the independent adviser on ministerial standards.’
Chancellor Rachel Reeves is expected to visit China for talks with vice premier He Lifeng at the end of the week.
Mr Ghani is understood to have given the flat on Finchley Road to Ms Siddiq’s sister Azmina, then 18, in 2009.
Land Registry documents state that the transfer was ‘not for money or anything that has a monetary value’.
The minister listed the flat as her address on Companies House on three occasions between 2012 and 2014, before becoming a Labour MP.
Her husband, Christian Percy, listed it as his residence as late as May 2016, by which time Ms Siddiq represented Hampstead and Kilburn. The property was sold for £650,000 in 2021.
A spokesman for Ms Siddiq said: ‘Any suggestion that Tulip Siddiq’s ownership of this property, or any other property is in any way linked to support for the Awami League, would be categorically wrong.’
Ms Siddiq was previously named in an anti-corruption investigation in Bangladesh.
She is alleged to have been involved in brokering a 2013 deal with Russia for a nuclear power plant in Bangladesh in which large sums of cash are said to have been embezzled.
Ms Siddiq has ‘denied any involvement in the claims’ accusing her of involvement in embezzlement, according to No 10.
Sources close to the minister have described the allegations as ‘spurious’.
Associated Press footage from 2013 shows Ms Siddiq attending the signing of the deal between her aunt and Russian president Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin.
Ms Siddiq voluntarily referred herself to Sir Laurie, Downing Street said.
Asked whether she had been told to refer herself to the independent adviser, the PM’s official spokesman said: ‘I would never get into private conversations, but it’s very clear that it was the minister’s idea to self-refer.’
The spokesman added that Sir Laurie would conduct a ‘fact-finding’ exercise to determine if ‘further action’ was needed, including a further investigation, and the Government would make the outcome of that exercise public, but could not set a timeline for it.
He said: ‘It will be conducted as swiftly as possible. It isn’t for me to place a timeline on an independent process.’