The Blair Foundation is undeniably doing a lot of good work, however Blair’s mixing of private consultancy and publicly funded charity is bound to raise conflicts of interest questions. The Jimmy Carter Center doesn’t do for-profit work, Henry Kissinger Associates doesn’t do charity. Blair is trying to have it both ways.

JP Morgan has controversial investments in Africa, was fined $88 million by the US government for sanctions busting, including in war torn South Sudan and pays Tony £2 million-a-year for advice. When the same person and the same office facilities are running two very different operations in the same place it is bound to make people uneasy about cross subsidy and mingling of objectives. At the very least…

Blair tried to dismiss it on Marr this morning as “the usual stuff” coming from the Mail on Sunday. That isn’t really good enough and DfID needs to make sure there is transparency and clear separation of Blair’s interests before public money is handed over. If he doesn’t want to reveal his contracts he shouldn’t get taxpayer funding.

See also: Blair Bids for Slice of DfID’s £8 Billion in Foreign Aid