Sue Grey has resigned

Just out of interest Nanna8. How does the team around the PM work in Australia? Would it, for example, be unusual for a Chief of Staff to the PM to have formerly been a highly experienced Civil Servant, as was the case with Sue Gray?
Are there lots of press stories around the inner workings of the PM's team? Do you think their Comms teams are effective?

No, our lot are pretty boring! I couldn’t name half of them except the PM and maybe Penny Wong the foreign minister who is pretty intelligent, like her or not.

Morgan McSweeney the Labour Party election guru who is to replace Sue Gray was fined for not declaring £750,000 in donations…

GrannyGravy13

Morgan McSweeney the Labour Party election guru who is to replace Sue Gray was fined for not declaring £750,000 in donations…

He's not an MP. Why would he a) have 'donations' in the first place and b) why would he have to declare them?

Any link to a story?

Lets just break that story open, as the Conservative Party were equally fined around the same time - 2020 - for failing to disclose donations

yes, In 2020 the group Labour Together apparently failed to disclose donations (different newspapers give different amounts) for campaigning purposes:

They were not personal donations in anyway, they are comparable to all general donations given to political parties.

They were rebuked by the Electoral Commission at the time, and were fined appropriately, £14000.

Around the same time - 2020

The Conservative Party has been fined £17,800 by the Electoral Commission after failing to accurately report a donation and keep a proper accounting record

www.electoralcommission.org.uk/media-centre/conservative-party-fined-inaccurate-donation-report

So lets just say, both parties failed to disclose very large amounts and were both fined

Neither are acceptable, but lets be even handed about it - will the Telegraph be revealing this too

Again, thank you Wyllow

Annie, all I did was to speculatively enter into search engine "Conservatives donation fined", it came up immediately, which presumably the Telegraph could have done.

They could have Wyllow but they chose not to.

A top civil servant who wrote the report on ‘partygate’ and subsequently becomes a top adviser to the new government, amongst all sorts of rumours and speculation which may or may not be true, is suddenly removed from her three month old post and given a different post, said to be not so close to the PM’s ear. Government supporters jump on the bandwagon to say there’s nothing to see here so stop discussing this, whilst others claim infighting in the government.
Who knows?
Interesting to watch from the sidelines though.

Rishi Sunak could have blocked her appointment for two years but did not.
He is a more decent man than his predecessors and successor.

Obviously, with her strong political views, she had a conflict of interests, at least during her later period as a civil servant. Civil servants should not show their bias and prejudices.

There were/are no suggestions of bias when Grey was working as a civil servant producing her key report which was published 25 May 2022, having worked alongside the police.

So Sunak had the power to block Gray’s appointment and didn’t? And we thought Sunak was incompetent? What did Sunak know that no one else did?

We don't know because we have no idea if she would have produced a similar report had a Labour government done the same.
Certainly she hasn't proved to be very good at advising Starmer about standards in public life.

That was in reply to Wyllow3

Obviously with her strong political views, she had a conflict of interests, at least during her later period as a civil servant.

Absolutely.
There were certain roles she was unsuitable for, and it was up to those in charge to assess her suitability for anything she was being asked to do. It appears this was not done by Johnson, Sunak, or Starmer.

Not the honeymoon period the LP were expecting. If it's this bad now goodness knows what the future holds for us all.

Ladyleftfieldlover

This is all very Daily Mail ish!

Yup, all the Tory/Reform Grans are out in force. There are other Grans here too though thank goodness.

Allira

Rishi Sunak could have blocked her appointment for two years but did not.
He is a more decent man than his predecessors and successor.

Obviously, with her strong political views, she had a conflict of interests, at least during her later period as a civil servant. Civil servants should not show their bias and prejudices.

I don't think anyone, other than perhaps the liar Johnson, has ever accused Sue Gray of bias or prejudice.

Prior to the partygate enquiry everyone said how good she was. Then, after the judgement went against Johnson she suddenly became biased .Strange that.

Regardless of the reasons that this has happened or whether she showed bias in her role of a Civil Servant, her new role is likely to be much lesser paid (if at all), is reported to be a big drop in status and doesn't appear to be in the direction Sue Gray was expecting her career to take.

I wasn't in favour of Sue Gray because I didn't think it was a good look to take on someone who had such a high profile with the Partygate investigation but I can't help thinking that Sue Gray has lost out to man in a man's world, something an awful lot of women experience.

I also know someone who worked closely with Starmer who said he was someone who was ruthless and duplicitous with an ability to throw someone under the bus at the drop of a hat if he thought they might harm his image. I took this with a pinch of salt but this latest happening does make me wonder.

How strange MayBee wonder why this could be

Sue Gray was well respected at the time across the board for her report. It followed police guidelines as to what was lawful or not: her job was to put together/gather available detailed evidence as part of a team, not alone, and write the report.

At the time she was praised (well, not by Johnson time) for the report, and went back to general Civil Service work under Sunak.

All civil servants have their own political views, but there is no evidence she therefore had bias (if there is, from that time, please produce it). There's a very strict code of conduct on it.

Her choice to leave meant she had the freedom to express her views, as do all civil servants on leaving.

I don't think her skills were suitable for the position she held in the L Party (nor the salary), as we are discussing (and still in the news this lunchtime)
But to attempt to smear her as less than honourable in her role in the Gray report, her previous civil Servant career are unfounded and disingenuous.

She was appointed for the role because of the respect and skills she had, by Sunak, who as people have said is a decent man, and carried it through properly.

icanhandthemback

Regardless of the reasons that this has happened or whether she showed bias in her role of a Civil Servant, her new role is likely to be much lesser paid (if at all), is reported to be a big drop in status and doesn't appear to be in the direction Sue Gray was expecting her career to take.

I wasn't in favour of Sue Gray because I didn't think it was a good look to take on someone who had such a high profile with the Partygate investigation but I can't help thinking that Sue Gray has lost out to man in a man's world, something an awful lot of women experience.

I also know someone who worked closely with Starmer who said he was someone who was ruthless and duplicitous with an ability to throw someone under the bus at the drop of a hat if he thought they might harm his image. I took this with a pinch of salt but this latest happening does make me wonder.

Yes. Someone wrote into TRIP’s and described Keir as ruthless, a description that I think surprised Rory ,Alastair and me too. Especially at a time when he was being described as dull and boring. It was a bit of a light bulb moment for me although, in retrosoect it had taken a lot of ruthlessness to turn the parties fortunes around the way that he did. Is it not a good thing to realise he isn’t the weak, mild mannered person that people imagined him to be? Imo I’m pleased that he’s a lot tougher than I’d realised but I don’t think he worries about his personal image. You need to be ruthless in politics these days. I do, however, think that he’s fair with it. I would imagine that Sue Grey has never liked being the focus of such attention, well paid or not.

She was appointed for the role because of the respect and skills she had, by Sunak, who as people have said is a decent man, and carried it through properly.

She was appointed by Johnson to report on PartyGate. His original choice, the Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case, had to be taken off the investigation because he had actually been at some of the parties.

Case was never any good as Cabinet Secretary. He was over promoted and couldn't keep a check on Johnson's excesses. He should have been 'let go' as soon as Labour came to power. I see that some commentators are as ascribing his resignation to Starmer's weakness, but we have known for a long while that he intended to leave in the New Year.

but I can't help thinking that Sue Gray has lost out to man in a man's world, something an awful lot of women experience.

That thought had crossed my mind, too, Icanhandthemback.

Thank you for the correction, MaizieD, on who appointed Sue Gray. So it was Johnson himself!