Our political editor WALTER CRONXITE on a report which suggest that the mates of the Prime Minister’s chief of staff are being put under pressure
Jason Cummings and Gavin Barwell, before one got the other one a job in Downing Street
Helen MacNamara, the head of ethics at the Cabinet Office, has written to every government Special Advisor working in Downing Street asking them to submit their Curriculum Vitae.
Steven Swinford, the deputy political editor of the Daily Torygraph, tweeted about this last night, taking a bit of a leap to suggest that it is the latest move by Theresa Mayhem’s government to get ready for a post-Brexit General Election.
“It’s being presented as an HR exercise to address issues around conditions and pay,” Swinford notes.
“But SPADs fear something else is going on.
“Is government gearing up for another election?” Swinford asked.
Our mole in Portcullis House suggests that there is another very good reason, however.
MacNamara is the senior official who has been handling complaints about abuses of his position by Croydon councillor Mario Creatura, who works in No10 as the Prime Minister’s Twitter monitor.
“They just want to find out how many staff got their jobs on the basis of a recommendation from Barwell,” said the mole, bluntly.
It might just be that someone in government has made the connection between Barwell’s influence, and the state that the nation’s in right now.
No10 SPAD and Croydon councillor Mario Creatura
Creatura is one of a handful of past and present Croydon Conservative councillors and supporters who have been handed cushty, public-paid jobs in Whitehall in the past 18 months.
That all coincides with Barwell – the failed MP for Croydon Central – landing on his feet by being handed the £140,000 per year position as the PM’s chief of staff, right after he’d been kicked out on his arse by the voters of Croydon.
As well as Creatura, there is Sara Bashford, the former Tory councillor and Barwell’s ex-aide. Also advising the top level of government is the former Woolworths store manager, Jason Cummings, whose previous job was as a parliamentary assistant to Barwell. He is now the deputy leader of the Tories on Croydon Council and works in Downing Street as the PM’s political adviser. And there is Nero Ughwujabo, who works in the No10 policy unit, who ran the Croydon BME Forum for 15 years before also benefiting from Barwell’s patronage.
Our mole says that the call-in of CVs, “Looks like a ‘pay and rations’ assessment – a means of applying pressure and utilising power.
“This kind of thing usually produces winners and losers – some may get re-grading or a pay rise, others will be earmarked for wage-hold if considered over-inflated.”
With Barwell and his Croydon cronies doing such a magnificent job over Brexit and the running of the country, it surely can only mean pay rises all-round. Can’t it?
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This will be an interesting performance review of Gav’s cronies Creatura and the other ones. How can you assess a performance that can only be described as a slow motion car crash?