Downing Street rejects Musk’s suggestion companies are turning away from UK
Downing Street insisted Sir Keir Starmer was running an “unashamedly” pro-growth government after Elon Musk lashed out at his policies.
Tesla boss Mr Musk said “very few companies” would be willing to put money into the UK under “the current administration”.
Mr Musk, a close ally of US President-elect Donald Trump, was responding to calls to build a new plant for his electric cars in Scotland.
Downing Street rejected Mr Musk’s assessment of the Government’s policies, but sought to avoid being drawn into a public spat with the owner of the X social media site and a member of Mr Trump’s inner circle.
Major donation
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: “I’m not going to kind of get into commentary on individual comments, but if you look at what’s happened since the election, you’ve seen the £63 billion of additional investment from the investment summit.
“You’ve seen the Government respond to some of the businesses’ key concerns in the UK, which is lack of stability, and the Government’s brought back that stability, both politically and economically.”
The spokesman said “the Government has taken an unashamedly pro-growth and pro-business approach”.
Writing on X, Mr Musk said: “Very few companies will be willing to invest in the UK with the current administration.”
Mr Musk is rumoured to be considering a major donation to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.
He met both Mr Farage and Reform’s treasurer Nick Candy at Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort earlier this month.
The tech entrepreneur’s relationship with Sir Keir and the Labour government is rocky.
Unrest
In September, the Tesla and SpaceX boss hit out at the UK after it was reported he had not been invited to a major investment summit because of his social media activities during the summer riots.
Mr Musk said: “I don’t think anyone should go to the UK when they’re releasing convicted paedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts.”
During the unrest over the summer, the billionaire had engaged with posts by Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, known as Tommy Robinson, suggested that civil war in the UK was “inevitable”, and retweeted a fake Daily Telegraph headline suggesting rioters would be sent to detention camps in the Falkland Islands.
While Rishi Sunak was in No 10, Mr Musk was guest of honour at an AI safety summit and took part in an “in conversation” event with the then-prime minister.
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Yeah, el Presidente Musk thinks he is some sort of Svengali king maker. He has security issues in the US over drugs and Putin (news reports). One of his car models is in the top 10 of car accidents in the US, cyber truck a joke, trashed twitter and allows some really nasty people on it, threw a terrible insult at a bloke that saved the lives of children, backed a convicted sex abuser and convicted felon and runs a company that has a potential to do untold damage to the atmosphere. And yank any links to starlink. I really… Read more »
According to an investigation by the Wall Street Journal, Weird Elon runs on a mixture of LSD, Cocaine, Ecstasy, and especially Ketamine. A previous associate has described him as drugged and deranged. This may be true or it may simply be scurrilous rumour. But if it is true, it may explain his erratic tendency to come out with notions at right-angles to the reality most of us inhabit. For his sake I most devoutly hope it is not true. At 53, he needs to be careful. Recreational chemicals a person can safely enjoy as a youngster begin to punish them… Read more »
This kind of intervention makes no sense unless there’s someone making him dance.
Tell Space Karen to go play with Putin. Honestly he is robbing the US taxpayer dry and will soon be in charge of advising his own handouts. We need nothing from him. He is a hateful wannabe Emporer
Whether Starmers’ administration is what you wanted or not, it was what the UK electorate freely voted in democratically and trounced BoJos’ celebrated 80 seat majority by double plus 14 but passed off without fanfare. We have decided oh but wait. Now we are being told it just won’t do and it will be ordered from across a vast ocean to the west that our democracy will be sidelined at the same time as theirs. President non elect Musk has spoken and speak he will not, to us, until his chosen puppet is installed here at his behest, NOT OURS.