Calls to remove Brine after lobbying claims

THE Commons’ health select committee is facing calls to remove its chairman following claims he broke lobbying rules during the pandemic, as revealed in The Telegraph’s Lockdown Files.

The Liberal Democrats have asked committee members to urge Steve Brine to step down while “deeply damaging allegations hang over his head”.

He was referred to Parliament’s standards watchdog last week after The Telegraph revealed that he told Michael Gove in February 2021 he had been “trying for months” to convince the NHS to hire anaesthetists through Remedium, a recruitment firm.

His message – contained in the leaked cache of 100,000 pandemic-era WhatsApp messages – showed that he had contacted Lord Stevens, then head of NHS England, and the Department of Health and Social Care.

Mr Brine’s declarations to the MPs’ Register of Financial Interests show he was paid £1,600 a month by Remedium between July 2020 and December 2021.

The parliamentary code of conduct says MPs cannot lobby ministers on behalf of organisations they have been paid by within six months.

The Lib Dems have now written to members of the health committee saying Mr Brine should stand down before a session due to take place on Tuesday.

In the letter, Daisy Cooper, the party’s health spokesman, said he should not continue the role given the “serious allegations and damning evidence of rule breaking”.

Mr Brine previously told The Telegraph: “This was about responding in the national interest to an urgent public call from ministers and the NHS in a national crisis even if, ultimately, it led nowhere, let alone secure any business for Remedium.”