We can’t stop revolving door

Watchdog admits power over ex-ministers’ top jobs is ‘zilch’

MANDARINS and ex-ministers can ignore rules on walking into lucrative private sector jobs because there is ‘zilch’ to stop them, the head of the Government’s watchdog has admitted.

Angela Browning, who chairs the vetting committee tasked with cracking down on the ‘revolving door’ scandal, confessed that the body has been criticised as ‘toothless’, lacking any real powers.

Senior civil servants and ministers should submit job offers for approval by the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments when they move to the private sector. It can stipulate conditions on work they can do to prevent conflicts of interest or ask them to wait two years before taking up the roles. However, Baroness Browning yesterday admitted there is little it can do to discipline those who ignore its advice or fail to apply for approval. ‘I have no powers of investigation,’ she told MPs on the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee.

Responding to Labour MP Paul Flynn’s questions on ex- ministers publicly lobbying for companies, she said: ‘I would have to go back to the permanent secretary in that department. I suspect that he would contact him, but his powers to actually say “off with his head” are pretty zilch.’

Mr Flynn said: ‘ The summit of your powers is to send a letter expressing your displeasure?’

Baroness Browning said: ‘ We are an advisory committee, we are not a regulatory committee.’ Mr Flynn said: ‘You wag your finger and people say “naughty, naughty”’, adding, ‘but you do not have the power to do anything.’

The Baroness insisted the body told the public about jobs former ministers and senior civil servants were taking that would otherwise be kept ‘secret’.

The Daily Mail has revealed that, since 2008, two thirds of jobs applied for by top ministers and mandarins were in sectors they were responsible for in office.

Last year, 33 ex-ministers were cleared to take up 123 jobs - the highest on record. The body was criticised for allowing the most senior civil servant in the Treasury, Sir Nicholas Macpherson, to become chairman of private bank C Hoare & Co which was accused of ‘exploiting’ off-shore finance services.

‘Wag your finger and say naughty, naughty’