Rightwing think-tank launches plan to ‘reshape Britain’

The rightwing lobby group Policy Exchange have shrugged off an ongoing Charity Commission investigation into political bias, launching a programme for “radical change” in the UK.

In October last year, we lodged a formal complaint with the charities regulator over the think-tank’s work.

Policy Exchange says they are an educational charity, and reap the benefits. Educational charities have to be “uncontroversial… generally supported by objective and informed people”. But Policy Exchange publish brazenly political reports attacking net zero, the right to protest and trans people.

Following our complaint, the Charity Commission opened a “regulatory compliance case”. But the think-tank have continued pushing rightwing positions.

Last week, Policy Exchange launched a programme to “reshape Britain” called Project 2029. The plan includes scrapping equality protections, leaving the European Convention on Human Rights, and shutting down dissenting voices.

The plan suggests it will offer a “detailed roadmap” for a “radical reforming government – of any party”, but its policy prescriptions are all drawn from one side of the political spectrum. The think-tank claims that “equality law, European human rights law and international law now distort almost every aspect of public policy”, asking “How should the UK go about freeing itself from the European Convention on Human Rights?” They trot out the rightwing myth of “two-tier” justice and ask how to “restore the primacy of public order”. And they throw timely action on the climate crisis into doubt, raising the question “how much is the current, rapid, trajectory towards net zero costing Britain?”

It’s a programme that is plainly modelled on the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 – a detailed policy manual which provided a blueprint for Donald Trump’s second term in office.

For Matthew Gill, a lawyer at Good Law Project, Policy Exchange’s initiative marks “a new low”.

“It’s shocking to see a charity that is already under investigation thumb their nose at the regulator,” Gill said. “But Project 2029 is only the latest example of a lobby group funded by dark money putting out rightwing talking points under the guise of education. It’s time for the Charity Commission to stamp out partisan propaganda outfits abusing their status as charities.”

We have written to the Charity Commission, urging them to move faster and without fear or favour to take action on think-tanks such as Policy Exchange which flout the rules.