The ‘Tufton Street nexus’ is a conspiratorial fantasy

No, free-market think tanks do not secretly run the country.

Adam Ramsey, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

One London address seems to trigger political hobbyists more than any other: 55 Tufton Street. Most normal people have never heard of Tufton Street and could not care less what happens inside No55. But its mere existence sends both EU rejoiners and eco-fanatics into meltdown. Extinction Rebellion has held numerous demos on Tufton Street. And this week, anti-Brexit campaign group Led By Donkeys performed a stunt outside the unassuming Westminster building.

Led By Donkeys is made up of four middle-aged men who bonded over a shared loathing of what they saw as the ‘lies, lunacy and hypocrisy’ surrounding Brexit. It specialises in publicity stunts designed to be shared on social media for the titillation of the laptop class. The name riffs off a description of First World War soldiers led by incompetent generals. But when applied to Brexit, it is hard not to conclude it thinks the ‘donkeys’ are the 17.4million Leave voters, rather than any of our hapless political leaders. Led By Donkeys came to prominence in 2019, as the campaign for a second referendum gathered pace. It carried on its campaigns even after Brexit became official.

For this week’s stunt, Led By Donkeys erected a huge fake English Heritage blue plaque on the outside of 55 Tufton Street. It declares: ‘The UK economy was crashed here, 23 September 2022.’ The date references PM Liz Truss and former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s disastrous mini-budget. A video, narrated by former BBC presenter Gavin Esler, was also projected on to the Tufton Street building.