There have been some changes to the Downing Street team since late last year. Shuffling deckchairs…
After a secondment period two new permanent briefing SpAds Bella Ford and Tom Hourigan have been hired to an enlarged team. Existing briefing SpAd Jason Keen has been promoted to head of briefings. Communications Director Tim Allan promised a “strong start in January.” Reach for the sky…
Ex-Mirror Pol Ed John Stevens has taken over the print liaison brief in No10. There are several other changes – new departmental SpAds alongside movement and additions in Downing Street. If you thought No10 wasn’t explaining itself enough…
Guido updates all changes live, and first. Find you thought the full up-to-date list of serving SpAds at order-order.com/spads
The newly-created Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister has cleared out the Cabinet Office SpAds and brought his own personnel in. Another reset completed…
Jospeh Knight, John Stevens, and James Kilmartin have left the department. Knight has gone to MHCLG and Stevens and Kilmartin left with McFadden to help with his downgraded DWP role…
Jones has brought Felicity Slater in from the Treasury as well as Adam Ludlow from the Labour Party insights team, to provide comms support. He already has a SpAd under the ‘Chief Secretary’ title – Callum Monro, who was working for Ian Murray at the Scotland Office. Jones, who is basically an additional Prime Minister, now has to wrestle with a dysfunctional Cabinet Office. The last month has seen Starmer operate a ‘shuffle the chairs until government magically starts working’ strategy…
Guido’s SpAd list is the definitive tracker of moves in government. Any moves? Let us know at team@order-order.com…
Attorney General Richard Hermer’s new SpAd is a rabid EU fanatic with eco-crazed sympathies. Here we go…
Richard Brooks starts today after the only previous Hermer SpAd Chris McQuiggin quit. Over what government sources tell Guido were differences of opinion with the Attorney General that grew too great…
Brooks enters government after a brief f six-month stint at pollster Ipsos and three years at consultancy Portland. Prior to that he worked as communications head at the pro-second referendum outfit For Our Future’s Sake. Which he also founded…
The new SpAd spent two years after his stint as Vice-President of the National Union of Students campaigning against Brexit, for a second referendum, and for freedom of movement. He said in a 2019 newspaper column: “It boggles my mind how there are some who claim that money should be able to move freely, but not people, and still say they are a socialist with a straight face.” Brooks went on:
“A bigger strategic issue, is that the generation changing the face of British politics right now – and a core of the Labour party’s support base – believe in open, diverse and outward looking politics. It’s why we back radical action on the climate crisis, want a people’s vote and defend freedom of movement to the hilt. Putting your party on the other side of a generational culture war isn’t just cowardly – it’s bad politics.”
Self-declared socialist Brooks wrote numerous pieces in favour of a second referendum under the umbrella of the People’s Vote campaign. In an Independent column Brooks praised the work of Extinction Rebellion and Greta Thunberg:
“A whole generation of young people – led by brilliant, diverse leaders like Greta – are rising up to take action where the generations before us have not. Extinction Rebellion – by any definition – has been a huge success. It’s achieved masses of media coverage for an important issue that had been ignored in the UK for at least 2 years. It’s put immense pressure on policy makers to respond.”
Brook’s evidence of that ‘success’ was that “Google searches on climate change have increased by 7 times since the beginning of the campaign.” Should any Labour people be unaware of the kind of brains now advising their lawyer-in-chief…
Hermer is already hated in government by political and civil servant figures alike for his constant obstructionism and disastrous Duty of Candour work. Brooks’ appointment should dispel any worries about the Attorney General straying from his deep progressive leftist beliefs…
The total SpAd costs have just been released by the government. Salary costs are a total of £9.5 million…
Here are the top paid SpAds in every department:
There was a bill of £3.1 million in severance payments to old Tory ones plus those that were ejected in the first Labour period. Sue Gray et al..
SpAds can make their own judgements as to where they want to work from these figures. No doubt some will feel a bit short changed…
There are swirling rumours about the fate of the man who made Starmer. The McIavelli was subject to media briefing over the welfare rebellion last week…
Government sources say there were fears that Downing Street chief of staff Morgan McSweeney was on the verge of resignation on Friday after Starmer began his impromptu media round by ‘dropping a Baldwin‘ then giving further whingeing interviews over the weekend which went down terribly. A personal repudiation of the ongoing McSweeney project which took Labour from its worst loss since 1935 to a landslide within five years…
SpAds to whom Guido has spoken for the most part don’t expect him to quit. As pundits point out Guido is arrestingly well-sourced – Starmer is being advised by old timers Louise Casey and Jonathan Powell who are not fans of the current personnel set up in Downing Street. Ire is directed at the political team in Downing Street which is seen as excessively junior, as well as at political director Claire Reynolds, who is said to have bungled the management of the now-rebellious Parliamentary Labour Party over welfare. Last month Reynolds was reported to have told MPs that the Labour vision for Britain was a “work in progress.” If Morgan stays there has got to be staff movement somewhere…
Some changes in the Downing Street policy unit as Starmer’s infrastructure SpAd Nick Williams departs. Williams was previously a civil servant in the Treasury before serving as Labour’s Head of Economic Policy from April 2023 and subsequently moving into No 10. He is gone now after ten months – his departure was made known last night…
The infrastructure SpAd role provides advice on housing and other projects. Guido hears Williams worked extensively on the Heathrow project and proposals in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill. Reeves has stacked much of Labour’s fortunes on housing in the Spring Statement all while Labour constantly insists it is charging ahead with grand projects. It strikes Guido as a good idea to have a replacement infrastructure adviser appointed pronto…
Churn goes on in government – ex-Mirror pol ed Jason Beattie is joining Liz Kendall’s adviser squad. Check Guido’s SpAd list for the latest – SpAds themselves can get in touch with their own updates…
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood introduced her speech on migration reforms at the IPPR:
“There’s no denying we meet at a difficult time for my party.”