Foreign aid minister’s husband on £25k to run her office
And he still finds the time to hold down 2 other jobs!
THE husband of foreign aid minister Priti Patel is being paid up to £25,000 to run her office – despite having two other jobs, it emerged yesterday.
Alex Sawyer gets the public money from his wife’s staffing allowance.
But he also works as a marketing consultant for the American financial giant Nasdaq and as a Conservative local councillor.
His role with Nasdaq – the world’s second largest stock exchange – is not publicly disclosed, even though MPs’ staff are obliged to declare any secondary jobs if there is a risk of a conflict of interest.
Mr Sawyer’s various jobs were discovered by The Times which said his Nasdaq consultancy included organising events and receptions for clients, arranging research papers and working on the Nasdaq stand at conferences.
He was listed as the main marketing contact for Nasdaq NLX, a European interest-rate futures market. The newspaper said he appeared to work a three-day week for Nasdaq.
Miss Patel, 45, the International Development Secretary, is seeking re-election as a Tory MP. She has employed her husband as her part-time office manager since February 2014.
According to the MPs’ expenses watchdog, Mr Sawyer received between £5,000 and £10,000 in two months before the end of that financial year. The year after that he earned between £20,000 and £25,000. Mr Sawyer, 41, is also a longstanding Conservative councillor in the London borough of Bexley and has served as a cabinet member there since May 2015. He is entitled to an allowance of about £23,000 funded by the taxpayer.
MPs’ staff are required to reveal jobs that are ‘in any way advantaged by the privileged access to Parliament afforded by [a] pass’.
Sir Alistair Graham, ex-chairman of the committee on
‘Privileged access’
standards in public life, said Mr Sawyer’s marketing job should have been declared, given the crossover of interests between the financial sector and politics.
‘The danger is that constituents and the public generally will think this is a device to access public funds and boost the family income,’ he added.
A spokesman for Miss Patel declined to comment yesterday. Mr Sawyer told The Times that he had never ‘worked for Nasdaq or Priti Patel simultaneously full-time’, adding: ‘I have always worked part-time in both roles like many others who balance two part-time jobs over the course of a week.’
He said he had always acted properly within the spirit and letter of parliamentary rules, and that neither he nor Nasdaq had ‘ benefited or been advantaged by my parliamentary pass, which is for my quite separate duties as part-time parliamentary office manager’.
The parliamentary authorities agreed with him, he said.
The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards would not comment on an individual case but said advice given to MPs’ aides was only guidance, adding: ‘The decision on whether or not to register something is down to the individual because they have a personal responsibility to make the registrations that are required.’
After the election, the rules will change so that MPs will not be allowed to employ family members – although present staff will not have to leave.
Miss Patel, attended Watford Grammar and Keele University. She joined the Tories as a teenager but spent two years in the Referendum Party.
She met Mr Sawyer while working in PR in the City. They married in 2004 and have an eight-year-old son, Freddie.