Peter Kyle has this morning gone for a hard line on the BBC’s in-depth investigation into Rachel Reeves’ expenses investigation at HBOS. The science secretary told the Today Programme:
“Well unfortunately the reporting has been totally inaccurate and we heard yesterday that the person who is actually Head of HR at that bank at that time says it’s untrue, said that she never ever received a file on Rachel Reeves… she says that before she left the bank there was no investigation that passed her desk and and she also said if there was one it would have passed her desk… people can see that the person who ran the HR department said that there was no file that passed her desk.”
As Kyle may be aware this is a misrepresentation of what Jane Wayper, a former HR business partner who was given permission to speak to the BBC by Reeves’s team, said. Wayper made clear “I would have been made aware of any investigation which concluded, there was case to answer” and said this did not happen. That is to say – if an investigation was concluded she would have seen it. The investigation, which did take place, did not conclude – Rachel left HBOS in May 2009…
As the BBC’s Billy Kenber and Phil Kemp set out in some detail in their investigation, the Internal Audit team conducted an initial investigation at the request of the risk department: “It found that there was evidence of apparent wrongdoing by the three senior managers including Reeves.” The investigation was then passed to the investigative segment of the Risk department. That was in April – one month before Reeves left. Rachel might want to get on the blower to her cabinet colleagues to explain what actually happened before they go out to bat for her on broadcast…
Speaking on Times Radio, former Home Secretary David Blunkett spoke about overdiagnosis of mental problems:
“Let’s distinguish those who are really severely mentally ill, diagnosed with things that require prolonged medical and diagnostic treatment. My wife and I talk about this a lot, because she’s a retired GP, about the fact that you can be sad without being ill. You can be momentarily depressed because your boyfriend or girlfriend’s just thrown you and you’re not mentally ill. You can even have mild issues, which can be dealt with with the right kind of support, but it doesn’t make you mentally ill. So we’ve got a real task, I think, to get the psychology, if you like, of this over. But there are things where you definitely need medical intervention, and there are other things where you need good friends, you need good connectivity, and you need a job.”