The politician’s guide on how to handle a scandal
As the row over Robert Jenrick’s role in the approval of a property scheme continues, Sean O'Grady considers what could happen next
As the celebrated 19th-century politician and historian Thomas B Macaulay famously put it: “We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodic fits of morality.”
The populace, in other words, ironically hypocritical, asks rather more of its rulers than it does of itself.
So it does, but that provides little more than wry comfort to the secretary of state for housing, communities and local government. Robert Jenrick has already had one run-in with public opinion in recent months, when he was accused of breaking lockdown and now his role in approving a lucrative property deal involving the billionaire Richard Desmond, a Tory party donor, has come in for some attention. A judge has already quashed the minister’s approval of the property development, and he has accepted he acted unlawfully.
It’s not a great start.
Can Jenrick survive his latest scrape? Every case is different, but here is a short guide to some general dos and don’ts.
First, it’s no good hiding away. Mr Jenrick has refused to attend the Commons to answer an “urgent question” on the matter, sending instead one of his junior ministers, Chris Pincher, to account for the episode. This will not appease Jenrick’s Labour opponent, Steve Reed, nor speaker Lindsay Hoyle, whose job it is to ensure parliament is able to hold individual ministers to account, which us why he granted permission for the special “urgent question” to be tabled. It simply doesn’t look good. If you have a defence, use it; if not then you will not survive an indefensible position for long anyhow. Even Dominic Cummings, formally “in contempt of parliament” and informally holding virtually the rest of humanity in contempt, conceded that it would have been better all round if he’d got his detailed version of his lockdown behaviour out sooner. Better for Jenrick to face down his critics in the Commons chamber than skulk around the tea room.
Although ministers are mostly unable to choose their enemies, Jenrick is unlucky in having the original story break in the Mail on Sunday. It cannot be lightly dismissed as some sort of politically motivated Labour/Remain plot. It’s just a good story and one that the public can easily grasp (unlike, aspects of the pandemic or, in earlier eras, the Iraqi super gun affair that damaged the Major government).
Third, conduct a series of risk assessments. Put yourself in the shoes of the prime minister and candidly ask yourself how bothered he’d be if he had to sack you. With Cummings the answer is self-evident, with huge amounts of political capital spent to preserve his place at the side of the prime minister. Or take the case of Priti Patel, whose fundamentalism has given her a bit of a fan base in the party, and is still hanging on, or Rishi Sunak, his meteoric rise and performance in his important job has given him figurative “big beast” status – virtually unsackable.
In the middle of a pandemic resignations are a distraction, and add to the sense of an incompetent administration; but dropping Jenrick would not cause much of a splash, and Johnson might be better to jettison sooner or later. No 10 doesn’t need any more wars of attrition with the media. There is no caucus of Jenrickites ready to fight his corner.
In such a state of vulnerability, Jenrick might be wise to ask the PM to organise a quick inquiry by the cabinet secretary into “the facts”. This, as we’ve seen with Patel, buys time and allows the heat to go out of a row. It allows Johnson to be seen to be doing something and reprimanding the minister, but leaving him in place, even if his promotion prospects are diminished.
Less palatable, though survivable, would be an investigation under the ministerial code a fact of political life since 1997. In his foreword to the current edition, Johnson states: “...We must uphold the very highest standards of propriety ...There must be no bullying and no harassment; no leaking; no breach of collective responsibility. No misuse of taxpayer money and no actual or perceived conflicts of interest. The precious principles of public life enshrined in this document – integrity, objectivity, accountability, transparency, honesty, and leadership in the public interest – must be honoured at all times... ”
An impressive declaration, and note, importantly for the Jenrick example, the injunction about “perceived” conflicts of interest. Having been examined by the cabinet office, the prime minister’s independent advisor on ministerial standards, Sir Alex Allan, makes a recommendation.
On the face if it, it seems to set a forbidding set of commandments; yet the code has no legal force, and it remains a political matter. There is in fact a long and varied list of ministers who’ve more or less survived such scrutiny and been cleared at one time or another, including Peter Mandelson, Peter Hain, Tessa Jowell, Shahid Malik, Mark Garnier and Alun Cairns. Sometimes they are found to have breached the code but the prime minister tries to keep them on anyway (such as Tony Blair with David Blunkett in 2005, though Blunkett quit anyway). The last minister to quit over a breach of the code was Damian Green in 2017 (allegations of viewing pornography and harassment).
In other words the onus is on the government machine to “prove” a minister broke the code, or, in the case of a conflict of interest, was perceived to break the code. Crucially, following any investigation the prime minister is the ultimate arbiter of whether there has been a breach of the code – judge and jury. The fact that any benefit from Jenrick’s role in the planning process accrued to the Conservative Party and not to Jenrick might form a defence, of sorts. The last remotely comparable instance of a cabinet minister having links to a property developer was Reginald Maudling. Now near forgotten he was a very big deal in his time and close personal financial links to the corrupt architect John Poulson did for his role as home secretary under Ted Heath (back in 1972).
Last, if things start to look unsalvageable, then a swift resignation to save the government embarrassment and distraction – whatever the merits of any allegations – at a difficult time might just allow for a subsequent comeback. There are plenty of retread ministers who weathered a period of political punishment and semi-exile in the wilderness (and sometimes more than one) – Mandelson, Blunkett, David Laws, Patel and Liam Fox being notable comeback kids in more recent times, and, further back, the likes of Cecil Parkinson managed to get over a famous scandal about his private life (which would probably have been hardly noticed today). On the whole, though, mud sticks.
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