A Conservative campaign director used information gleaned from meetings with Rishi Sunak to bet on an early general election date.
Anthony Lee and his wife, Laura Saunders, herself a Tory parliamentary candidate, placed a £2,000 bet for the exact day of the 2024 snap poll after hearing various possible dates floated by the then-prime minister.
They would have pocketed more than £23k from their win based on ‘inside information’ had the gamble not been uncovered, Southwark Crown Court heard.
Allegations of betting on election dates first came to light during the 2024 campaign, when PPS Craig Williams was alleged to have gambled £100 on a July poll in May, before Mr Sunak called it.
Williams apologised for his ‘huge error of judgement’, but several other key No 10 aides were also reported to have placed bets on the back of their access to private meetings.
Among these was Lee, 49, who abused inside knowledge that July 4 was a ‘working date’ for a snap election.
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The day had been discussed in a Downing Street meeting on March 10, prosecutor Zoe Johnson KC said.
While Lee wasn’t present at the meeting, which was attended by Williams and Conservative strategist Isaac Levido, he was privy to meetings with Tory figures, as well as email correspondence, including one message entitled ‘Crazy idea: Campaign discussion’.
Mr Sunak considered at least three separate options for an early poll, from May to early July.
Lee placed 71 bets on an election occurring between July and September while his wife placed eight and attempted a ninth for the same period.
Ms Johnson said the scandal had caused harm to the ‘democratic system as a whole’, adding that Lee had used his unique position for ‘personal profit’.
Richard Pratt KC, defending Lee, said the Tory insider still considered the bet to be a ‘gamble’ given he didn’t have concrete knowledge of the date and that the PM was able to change his mind.
The couple, however, both admitted to charges of cheating.
He was given a sentence of 10 months and two weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, while Saunders, 38, was sentenced to four months and two weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for a year.
Lee was required to undertake 100 hours of unpaid work and pay more than £6.6k in compensation, while his wife must carry out 40 hours of unpaid work and pay a fine of £4,265.
A sentencing hearing was also told today that Amy Hind, the wife of former Conservative digital director Anthony Hind, had also wagered money on the secret date.
She stood to make £26k from seven bets worth £2.3k on a July election date, on the back of information from either her husband or ‘close contacts’ at CCHQ.
Hind, 36, was handed a sentence of six months suspended for a year, on top of a requirement to complete 50 hours of unpaid work.
All three have been banned for 12 months from accessing or using online gambling websites or applications.
Judge Tony Baumgartner, sentencing, told the trio they had ‘risked undermining’ the confidence held by voters in the Conservative Party as an ‘institution’.
‘More significantly, it undermines trust in the democratic process’, he added.
Williams, the former Tory MP for Montgomeryshire and Cardiff North, is to be sentenced at a later date when other party officials alleged to have cheated stand trial.
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