New Year’s gong for Kate and William’s VERY stylish friend
THERESA MAY is set to elevate a one-time Tory rising star to the House of Lords just 18 months after she lost her seat in the Commons, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Former junior Health Minister Nicola Blackwood – once tipped as a future PM – was one of the highest- profile casualties of the Conservatives’ 2017 General Election disaster.
She is now being lined up by Downing Street for a shock comeback at the Health Department as a Minister in the Lords – but the appointment risks sparking a fresh row about lobbying.
Since losing her marginal seat of Oxford West and Abingdon to the Liberal Democrats in June last year, she has been working on health projects for Peter Mandelson’s lobbying company Global Counsel. The company’s website boasts about her ‘experience from the health sector’ and notes that she works in ‘policy areas related to technology and healthcare’.
When she took up the paid role as a senior adviser, Ms Blackwood was banned from contacting Government officials for two years due to fears of the Whitehall ‘revolving door’ that sees former Ministers cash in on their contacts in the private sector.
In a letter in April, the anti - corruption watchdog t he Advisory Committee on Business Appointments warned her: ‘ There are risks attached given you are seeking to advise on matters related to your ministerial responsibilities.’
And officials insisted ‘ any use of your contacts, gained from your time in ministerial office, in order to influence Government policy or seek to do business with Government, would be inappropriate’.
They handed her a ‘cooling-off ’ period of 24 months where she was ordered not to contact Ministers, advisers or civil servants in a professional capacity. Despite her work for Labour grandee Lord Mandel son, No 10 wants Ms Black wood to replace James O’Shaughnessy as the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Health and Social Care when Parliament returns from its Christmas break next week.
Lord O’Shaughnessy resigned unexpectedly from his role two weeks ago for family reasons.
The Mail on Sunday understands that Ms Blackwood’s seat in the upper chamber is subject to approval by the Lords Appointments Commission, which will convene next week and is likely to scrutinise her lobbying work before passing any j udgment. Last night Labour’s Shadow Cabinet Offi ce Minister Jon Tri ckett criticised the planned appointment, saying: ‘If the Tories do plan to put Nicola Blackwood in the House of Lords and make her a Health Minister, it is yet another shocking example of the revolving door between highly paid advisory roles and lobbying, and the Government. She was rejected by voters in 2017, so the Conservatives should listen to the public and back down on appointing her to the House of Lords and then placing her straight into the Department of Health.’
Ms Black wood did not respond to requests for comment last night.