CAMERON UNDER THE GRILL
Ex-PM endures four hours of heat by MPs in lobbying storm... but STILL won’t tell them how much he was paid
DAVID Cameron denied his desperate lobbying of the Government was driven by greed as he was grilled for the first time over the Greensill Capital scandal yesterday.
The former prime minister was accused of ‘stalking’ ministers and officials as well as ‘demeaning’ himself and his position by sending a barrage of texts and emails on behalf of the ‘fraudulent enterprise’ he worked for.
But although he admitted it was a ‘painful day’ for him to return to Parliament and endure almost four hours of hostile questioning by two separate select committees of MPs yesterday, he defended his work for the now-collapsed finance firm.
He insisted it had not been ‘some giant fraud’ and said Greensill had a ‘really good idea’ for how the Government could help businesses in the pandemic.
Although Mr Cameron repeatedly refused to reveal what his ‘generous’ salary was at the firm, he denied that fear the company would go bust and he would lose out on his income was the reason for his lobbying blitz.
‘That’s not what I felt at the time and it’s not what motivated me,’ he told the Treasury committee. ‘I can absolutely say to you that I really believed in the solution that we had and we were putting to Government that I thought would make a difference.
‘I did not believe in March or April, when I was doing this contact, that there was a risk of Greensill falling over.’
Mr Cameron joined finance firm Greensill as a senior adviser in August 2018. He went on a behind-the-scenes lobbying blitz as the Covid-19 pandemic struck and the company sought access to a £200million state-backed Covid loan scheme.
This would have allowed the company to issue loans, insured by the Government, to help firms through the pandemic.
Official records have since revealed that between March and June last year he sent 62 text messages and WhatsApps to Chancellor Rishi Sunak, former friend Michael Gove and junior Treasury ministers as well as the department’s top civil servants and a deputy governor of the Bank of England.
Appearing by video link from his Oxfordshire home to answer questions on the affair for the first time, Mr Cameron told MPs in a seven-minute opening statement: ‘This is a painful day, coming back to a place that I love and respect so much, albeit virtually, but in these circumstances.’
He admitted that, although lobbying itself is a ‘ necessary and healthy part of our democratic process’, it is open to misinterpretation when done by a former PM. He admitted he should have only written formal letters rather than sending texts.
In considering reforms, he suggested that firms’ in-house advisers, such as himself, could be added to the official register of lobbyists and that former PMs could be forced to wait longer than the current two years before they are allowed to contact their former colleagues in Whitehall. He also suggested a committee to advise ex-PMs on business appointments, saying: ‘ There really isn’t a road map for an ex-prime minister, particularly for a younger one who doesn’t just want to be on the board of some big bank and make the odd speech.’
Mr Cameron admitted his approaches to the Government had been ‘persistent’ but said this was because it was a time of crisis and Greensill’s branch of finance needed a ‘push’ to be properly considered.
He was adamant the firm was in ‘good financial health’ a year ago despite press reports suggesting it was not and he had ‘no sense of jeopardy’. Greensill went bust in March when its insurers pulled
‘There’s no road map for an ex PM’ ‘More like stalking than lobbying’
cover, leading to the loss of 1,000 jobs. Mr Cameron said: ‘I am extremely sorry and sad that it has come to this end. Clearly there were faults with the business.’
But he insisted: ‘Just because a business goes into administration doesn’t mean… the whole thing was a giant fraud.’
Mr Cameron was at his most defensive when asked about what he earned from Greensill. There were reports that he had share options that could have been worth £60million had the firm ever floated on the stock market.
He admitted: ‘I was paid a generous annual amount, far more than what I earned as Prime Minister, and I had, shares, not share options.’ He said the £60million figure was ‘completely absurd’ but when committee chairman Mel
Stride asked him if he was paid more than £1million he said only it was the sort of ‘big salary’ he could have got working at a large bank.
Before the hearings Mr Cameron was pictured carrying a designer bag by Smythson of Bond Street, worth around £1,400. His wife Samantha was creative director at the brand between 1997 and 2010.
He was also quizzed by Labour’s Dame Angela Eagle about reports that he flew on a Greensill private jet from his third home in Cornwall.
He said: ‘It was used quite a lot by Lex Greensill and senior man
agers, and sometimes myself on business visits.’ Dame Angela described Mr Cameron’s messages to ministers as ‘more like stalking than lobbying’ and asked: ‘Looking back, are you at least a little bit embarrassed?’ He replied: ‘It was a particularly acute time in the British economy. The Government was introducing plans to try and help businesses, we thought we had a good idea.’ Another Labour MP, Siobhain McDonagh, said to him: ‘Do you not feel that you have demeaned yourself and your position by WhatsApping your way around Whitehall on the back of a fraudulent enterprise?’ Mr Cameron said: ‘I made a choice to work for a business which I hoped would be a UK… success story.’
Treasury committee members were concerned about one exchange between Mr Cameron and top Treasury civil servant Sir Tom Scholar, which appeared to discuss a top-secret interest rate cut. In a text published this week, the former PM said he ‘Never quite understood how rate cuts help a pandemic’ but the next sentence was redacted.
Asked what he meant, Mr Cameron said: ‘I think I’m a victim of spellcheck here – I think it was about a VAT cut.’
Appearing later before the public accounts committee, he said he believed he was hired by Greensill for his ‘enthusiasm’ at a time when it was seeking to ‘expand internationally’.
‘I hoped it would be a success story’