Partygate investigator Sue Gray broke civil service rules “as a result of the undeclared contact” between her and the Labour Party, a Cabinet Office investigation has found.
Gray—who led an investigation into allegations of parties being held in Downing Street in breach of the COVID-19 lockdown rules—accepted a job offer from Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer soon after she resigned from the civil service in March.
The move prompted claims from former Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Conservative MPs that she was politically biased and her Partygate report was tarnished.
But a separate Cabinet Office inquiry found that Gray, who refused to give evidence to the government probe, broke the civil service code due to her contact with Labour ahead of her resignation.
‘Political Stunt’
In a written ministerial statement on Monday, Cabinet Office minister Jeremy Quin said that the investigation “found that the civil service code was prima facie broken as a result of the undeclared contact between Ms. Gray and the leader of the opposition.”He added: “The rules and guidance that govern the conduct of civil servants are clear and transparent. It is deeply unfortunate that events have transpired in this way.”
Responding to the conclusion, a Labour Party spokesman said: “All rules were complied with. The ACOBA process makes that clear.”
He called the Cabinet Office statement “a political stunt by a Tory government,” which “spent weeks wasting time on this Mickey Mouse nonsense while refusing to investigate the serious allegations of sexual assault against their London mayoral hopeful Daniel Korski.”
Korski, a former Downing Street adviser during David Cameron’s premiership, pulled out of the race last week to be the Tory candidate to take on Sadiq Khan in the capital after it was alleged he groped a TV producer in No. 10 a decade ago.
Concerns Over Impartiality
Gray said Starmer raised the possibility of joining his team when he called her in late October 2022, according to the ACOBA investigation.“She said she might be open to such a possibility if she were to leave the civil service,” it added.
But she told the team there was no formal job offer until March 2, which was the day she resigned.
Government departments flagged that the “unprecedented circumstances under which Ms. Gray left her role” had led to “commentary in public and in Parliament which questions the impartiality and integrity of the Civil Service.”
The departments told ACOBA: “The proposed employment risks lowering public trust in the Civil Service.
“To that end, in order to ensure that the currency of any government information held has degraded by the time the applicant takes up the role, and to create a clean break between government and political service, we recommend a waiting period of 12 months.”
ACOBA said on Friday that it “shared some of the concerns” raised by government departments, but said it had seen “no evidence” that her decision-making or impartiality was “impaired” while serving in Whitehall.
ACOBA said a waiting period of six months until Gray takes up her position as Labour’s chief of staff would be “proportionate” to mitigate potential risks.
In its advice, the watchdog said: “Given the lack of commercial risk, and the limited scope for undue influence, the committee determined that twice the standard waiting period would be proportionate to mitigate the risks identified, providing a clear break of six months before Ms. Gray takes up the role.”
