The new(ish) Cabinet Secretary had just been accused by MPs of being evasive.
Eh? Civil servants being tricksy? Choke! Cough! Splutter! Who could even think such a thing?
Mr Case had been summoned before the public affairs committee to answer questions on sleaze. I use the word ‘answer’ rather loosely – the session was a two-hour tutorial in prevarication. A masterclass in obfuscation. Sir Humphrey Appleby would have been proud. Opening salvos concentrated on his hunt for the leaker of the decision last October to institute a second national lockdown – the so-called ‘chatty rat’.
Simon Case, the Cabinet Secretary and the UK s most senior civil servant, giving evidence on the work of the Cabinet Office to the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC)
The rat remains elusive: what we learned from Simon Case about rows besieging No 10
Cabinet Secretary gives little away during grilling by MPs, as Boris Johnson continues to feel the heat over mounting controversies
26 April 2021 • 10:04pm
Dominic Cummings claimed that Boris Johnson wanted donors to secretly pay for the renovation work on his Downing Street flat
Credit: Phil Noble/Reuters
Boris Johnson was battling on multiple fronts on Monday as pressure mounted over the funding of his Downing Street flat refurbishment and the future of a leak inquiry he was accused of trying to hamper.
Questions on these controversies and others were thrown at Cabinet Secretary Simon Case during a rare scheduled appearance before a select committee of MPs.
Last modified on Mon 26 Apr 2021 14.33 EDT
A failed financier at the centre of a Downing Street lobbying scandal had no contract to work for the government despite spending years inside No 10 under David Cameron, a committee of MPs has been told.
Lex Greensill had a desk and a security pass to gain access to the prime minister’s offices, senior civil servants told MPs. But officials disclosed on Monday that he was neither a civil servant nor a special adviser and they could find no contracts for Greensill’s three years in Whitehall.
Appearing before the public administration and constitutional affairs committee on Monday, Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, said he was surprised and puzzled by the lack of paperwork.
A senior Cabinet Office official has admitted that Lex Greensill’s appointment to a role in Downing Street was a “screaming, glaring conflict of interest”.
Darren Tierney, director general of propriety and ethics in the Cabinet Office, told the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) that the Australian financier’s exact role as an adviser was “unclear”.
Links between Greensill Capital, a firm which was founded by the financier, the Government and David Cameron have come under scrutiny amid controversy over the former prime minister’s lobbying on behalf of the firm.
The disclosures over Mr Cameron’s lobbying activities on behalf of Greensill – including sending texts to Chancellor Rishi Sunak – led to Prime Minister Boris Johnson ordering a review by the senior lawyer Nigel Boardman.