Sleazebusters face axe

THE anti- sleaze watchdog that forced David Blunkett to resign could be facing the axe.

Tony Blair has been handed a report calling for the abolition of the Whitehall advisory committee on business.

The committee aims to stop ministers and senior civil servants taking up lucrative positions too soon after leaving Westminster. Mr Blunkett, the former Work and Pensions Secretary, was forced to quit in November after the committee ‘ named and shamed’ him for failing to consult it over jobs he took in the four months after he first resigned from Cabinet.

The advisory committee, led by Lord Mayhew, released correspondence showing he had ignored its warnings that he was breaking the ministerial code of conduct.

The report by Sir Patrick Brown, a former permanent secretary at the Department for Transport, was commissioned 18 months ago after Mr Blair rode roughshod over the committee’s recommendations in the case of former air chief marshal Sir John Day.

It wanted a year-long delay in his appointment as a military advisor to the defence contractor BAE Systems on the grounds that the company would benefit from inside knowledge to win contracts. But Mr Blair overruled it.

The report suggests responsibility for vetting could be passed to civil service commissioners. Mr Blair has already been criticised for scrapping the 83-year- old honours scrutiny committee, a watchdog that aimed to prevent political donors being rewarded with knighthoods and peerages.

Tory frontbencher Chris Grayling, who was instrumental in challenging Mr Blunkett’s transgressions, said: ‘This is a completely breathtaking act by the Prime Minister. He has become completely arrogant and out of touch.’

‘In opposition he demanded accountability and now he is considering abolishing this committee.’

Mr Blair has been sitting on the Brown Report since the summer.

Yesterday a Cabinet Office spokesman said: ‘ It will be published shortly.’