Lord Geidt's report into Boris Johnson and where the money came from to refurbish the Downing Street flat was published yesterday. If you’re interested you can see it here. Geidt, the PM's "independent adviser on ministers' interests," delivered exactly what he was appointed to do. He found the prime minister had only acted “unwisely” in what looks like a clear breach of the ministerial code and a resigning matter. It was another step down the slippery slope into the abyss where truth, honesty, ethics and integrity are being crushed out of existence in British public life.
Strangely, there was a link to the report in the BBC's coverage of the story last night but I note this morning it has now been removed, as if someone doesn't want you to read it.
It turns out the former Vice Chairman of the Conservative Party, Lord Brownlow first paid for the refurbishment in October 2020, but was quickly reimbursed by Tory central office. They then expected a trust set up by Brownlow would raise the money and pay them back. It was not until March this year that Johnson, reading about it in the media apparently, realised this is where the money came from. He then paid Central Office back..
If you believe this, you are both naïve and gullible.
The work was started in April 2010 and according to the rpeort, Geidt claims that legal advice in mid-June 2020 then “raised doubts about whether the Trust, as initially conceived, would be capable of dealing with costs associated with the private residences at Downing Street.”
Despite that, Brownlow accepted an appointment by the Prime Minister to chair the Trust (the one thought incapable of dealing with the costs) on 10 July 2020. At that stage, there was an exchange of letters, although the trust was and "remains still no more than a proposition, having no legal personality whatsoever."
However, Brownlow, was still thought to have experience to get it going. Geidt says he, "pursued this task with energy and due regard for propriety throughout." He pursued it with so much “energy” that it was not till late autumn that it was "apparent that a Trust capable of meeting the original objects (including the costs of refurbishing the No 11 Downing Street residence) was still likely to be many months off."
Thank God he didn’t take it easy eh?
On 20 October 2020, Brownlow confirmed to Cabinet Office officials, that he had the day before settled "an invoice" for the No 11 Downing Street residence refurbishment works "directly with the supplier."
Between that date and 8 March 2020 when Johnson paid the money, Brownlow and Johnson had meetings (described as limited contact) but apparently - and here you have to suspend belief - neither of them mentioned the money or the trust.
This is explained away by Geidt with this, "Under normal circumstances, a Prime Minister might reasonably be expected to be curious about the arrangements, and especially the financial arrangements that led to the refurbishment of his apartment at Downing Street." Err, you bet.
The flat had indeed been refurbished, the total cost of which we still don’t know but it appears to be between £90 and £200,000, and the PM was living in it but displayed no desire to find out who paid the bill. Presumably he thought the money would appear by divine providence, he was waiting Micawber like for something to "turn up." and luckily for him it did, in the form of not Mr Brownlow, the mysterious benefactor in Oliver Twist, but a member of the peerage of the same name, Lord Brownlow.
".....at no point in the eight months until late February 2021, as media reports were emerging, was the Prime Minister made aware of either the fact or the method of the costs of refurbishing the apartment having been paid."
The excuse given is that the PM was busy with the pandemic. This is an insult to others who have responsible jobs and busy lives but are expected to manage their own finances without a gang of civil servants to advise them. It is civil servants who are blamed for not advising him about his own finances:
It jars that Geidt is more explicitly critical of cabinet office officials for not protecting the PM from the consequences of his own lifestyle choices and actions than he is of the PM for those choices and actions. Redolent of “junior heads must roll”
— Robert Peston (@Peston) May 28, 2021
"It is the case that the Prime Minister was ill-served when officials did become aware, albeit they were no doubt also managing their own very difficult circumstances."
Was there a conflict of interest in accepting the money. The Ministerial code says:
Ministers should not accept any gift or hospitality which might, or might reasonably appear to, compromise their judgement or place them under an improper obligation;
Lord Brownlow however, says he has "considered the nature of that support and [he is] content that no conflict (or reasonably perceived conflict) arises as a result of these interests" and, "and there is no evidence that [Brownlow] acted with anything other than altruistic and philanthropic motives." Well, that's alright then.
Note, a QC says on this point he is wrong:
Geidt is wrong. The interests of Lord Brownlow manifestly give rise to actual or potential/perceived conflicts, which is the very reason that the rules required the payment be declared. See for example: https://t.co/uCReHawNmz https://t.co/qtej5xFGEo
— Jessica Simor QC (@JMPSimor) May 28, 2021
Brownlow is the founder of the privately owned investment portfolio and trading group, Havisham.
Johnson comes across to me as unbelievably incurious, almost child-like.
There are even questions being raised by the Public Accounts Committee about the process used to appoint Geidt in the first place, and whether there was a lack of transparency about the process and the criteria applied. I think the main criteria was that he would go easy on Johnson. The report has trashed his reputation and if a shred of evidences emerges in future to contradict his report, he will go down as Lord Hutton did after the Iraq war inquiry
Hancock
If you found all that unbelievable, let’s turn to Health Secretary Matt Hancock. Cummings launched a salvo against him on Wednesday, but Geidt defended him on Friday. His was only a “technical” breach of the ministerial code.
Hancock owns a 20% stake in Topwood Ltd, a company run by his sister and brother-in-law. Topwood was awarded a framework contract with NHS Shared Business Services Ltd while he was health secretary. Geidt says (I am not kidding):
"It is reasonable to assume that Mr Hancock’s sister and brother-in-law, the owners of Topwood Ltd., would have been well aware of his appointment as Secretary of State at the time of their company securing this contract with NHS SBS. Either the Secretary of State’s sister and/or brother-in-law failed to raise this award with Mr Hancock, or nothing had otherwise been brought to Mr Hancock’s attention such that he would have had reason to enquire."
You read that right. His sister was "well aware" of his job. You can say that again, Where were they living? He was on TV regularly and had been an MP for years.
And they failed to mention the contract so clearly he didn't ask! What!
Geidt the gullible, who apparently believes this, then adds:
"I believe there to be a danger that a reasonable person might perceive this link to represent a conflict of interest, and that it should have been declared at the time. In reaching this determination, I accept that the scale of NHS operations in England (for which the Secretary of State is responsible) are broad and that the activity of NHS SBS may have been very far from the Secretary of State’s main focus. I assess this earlier failure to declare the interest was as a result of his lack of knowledge and in no way deliberate, and therefore, in technical terms, a minor breach of the Ministerial Code. I have advised the Prime Minister accordingly. In coming to this finding, I recognise that Mr Hancock has acted with integrity."
What do you need to do to break the code in a non-technical way?
It seems to me that ordinary people like you and me conduct ourselves in a way we wouldn’t find hard to defend if anything we did ever came to public attention.
My mother was poor. She never owned a watch, never had a holiday, bought clothes at jumble sales and, with my father, brought up four kids. She was painfully honest. When Gas and electricity bills (after the old meters were taken out) arrived they were paid the same day after a bus ride into town!
She would have been mortified if anybody even thought she was in any way dishonest. She was once accidentally given two items in a shop instead of the one she had paid for and didn't discover the fact until getting home. She immediately took a bus back to the shop.
What was the item? Just a pair of stockings.
You don't forget things like that. I despair at the antics of what amazingly, we used to describe as our betters.
