Following news that Home Secretary Suella Braverman asked civil servants to help her arrange a private speed awareness course after she was caught speeding last year, FDA Assistant General Secretary Amy Leversidge said it “is clear in the Ministerial Code that public duties must be separate from private interests and Suella Braverman really should have known better”.

 

FDA General Secretary Dave Penman echoed these views, telling Channel 4 News that Braverman “should know the obvious conflicts of interest that are involved in asking civil servants to not only do work on her personal matters but also on an issue where there’s a clear conflict about her role as the Home Secretary”. He also told BBC News that “there needs to be an investigation under the Ministerial Code”.

 

“The Ministerial Code is absolutely clear, ministers have a personal obligation to make sure there’s a separation between their private interests and their public duties,” he said. “This is really important because if she’s asked civil servants to make inquiries on her behalf to a company that arranges these speeding courses, that’s going to appear like it’s the government asking, that it’s the Home Office asking for that from the company, rather than from Suella Braverman as an individual. So, that’s why it’s really critical that there’s a separation between personal interests and government business. If, as is reported, she did attempt to get civil servants to do that, that’s a breach of the Ministerial Code. That’s something that should be investigated. She has potentially asked civil servants to breach their own code of ethics by doing it, though they appear to have refused to do so. And in any event, all of this as a set of circumstances for a Home Secretary and former Attorney General is not good.”

 

Penman further explained why the request was so inappropriate in a quote to the FT, where he said that civil servants are “publicly funded” and so “they’re not there to support the personal interests of a minister. They don’t do their shopping, they don’t look after their children and they don’t sort out their speeding fine”.

 

In studio with Kay Burley, the FDA General Secretary also strongly refuted claims that civil servants are targeting individual ministers: “This is about ministerial misconduct, so it’s not about anyone coming for anyone. Dominic Rabb was found to be a bully by an independent investigation. Suella Braverman faces accusations about her conduct and whether she’s abused her power. That can only be settled by an independent investigation.”

 

Leversidge also defended civil servants for referring to matter to the propriety and ethics team after being asked to arrange the private course, telling GB News that “there’s no way that civil servants could have done that without breaking the Civil Service Code”.