‘Let entrepreneurs run our public bodies’
ENTREPRENEURS will be encouraged to apply to run public bodies to provide “more cognitive diversity among public appointments” by a campaign group set up by Andrew Griffith, Boris Johnson’s former business adviser.
Mr Griffith, with backing from six Conservative MPs from the 2019 intake as well as a Thatcher-era former Cabinet minister, are backing the Campaign for Economic Growth, which will make the case for business in the media and public life. Mr Griffith – who served as
Mr Johnson’s chief business adviser in 10 Downing Street last year – said he wanted to encourage successful business people to apply for jobs dominated by applicants from the public sector.
In a letter to all Tory MPs, he said: “We will identify business advocates and encourage individuals from the world of business to put themselves forward to provide much-needed cognitive diversity amongst the many public appointments that are made each year and which are currently disproportionately drawn from those whose experience is within the public sector.”
Mr Griffith, a former chief financial officer at BSkyB and latterly a board member at the online delivery service Just Eat, is a close ally of Mr Johnson. He allowed the PM’s leadership campaign to be run from his Westminster town house last year.
He said: “We must not leave to the Government alone the imperative to make the first principles case for an economy that can grow rapidly enough to satisfy the many demands on its resources.”
Lord Young of Graffham, who was a trade and industry secretary in Margaret Thatcher’s government and then advised David Cameron, added: “This is an important initiative in light of the unique economic problems facing the country today. If we adopt the right policies this could be a steep but shortlived recession and we will emerge stronger than ever.”
Separately in an article for The Sunday Telegraph today, former Goldman Sachs chief David Sismey, a founding director of the campaign group, said the UK needs “literally thousands of private sector enterprises across every part of the UK” to repower the economy after the pandemic.
Mr Sismey called for “an Office of Regulatory Assessment as a key component of improving productivity and the supply side of the economy”, modelled on the Office of Budgetary Responsibility.
Examples included allowing restaurants to sell takeaway food “without mountains of paperwork” or letting councils make decisions via online video links were two examples. He wrote: “Some regulation is necessary. But like the spring clean that many of us have conducted at home during lockdown, it makes sense every now and again to have a proper clear-out.”