Sue Gray, the senior civil servant who led the inquiry into the “partygate” affair that undermined Boris Johnson’s British government, has sparked Tory outrage by quitting as chief of staff to Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer.
Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, may have intervened to block Gray from taking a key role in Starmer’s office for months, drawing fury within the Conservative party. “People are disgusted,” said one senior party official.
Grey’s move has drawn criticism from some of Johnson’s allies for suggesting the former prime minister was a victim of a “stitch-up” of the establishment over partygate, the Covid-19 key party scandal in Downing Street.
But the move has also shocked senior civil servants, who now fear they will again be accused of institutional bias against the Conservatives.
Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, only learned of the proposed move when news leaked on Wednesday night, raising concerns that Gray had spoken to Starmer without notifying his boss.
“People were shocked,” said one Whitehall official. Another said: “Even sane people will now question our impartiality. Mud-slinging against civil servants will be bad enough.
The Cabinet Office confirmed Gray had stepped down as permanent second secretary at the Department for Leveling Up, Homes and Communities and added: “We are reviewing the circumstances surrounding his resignation.”
Labor insisted that Gray had been offered the job and accepted that Sunak could use his authority to delay the move of civil servants to Starmer’s office for months.
“We’ve always thought about gardening leave, but we think we need to get a senior authority on how the machinery of government works,” a Starmer ally said.
Gray, who ran Whitehall’s propriety and ethics team from 2012 to 2018, became a household name when he was asked to lead the partygate inquiry.
Their preliminary findings were published in January 2022 with the final report published last May, just a few days after the Metropolitan police issued 126 fixed penalty notices to 83 people who took part in the illegal lockdown party in Whitehall – including Johnson and chancellor Sunak.
He will now go through the Whitehall screening process – carried out by the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments – which all senior mandarins must pass before working outside Whitehall.
Sunak will make the final decision on how long Gray must wait before moving, but Tory officials said precedent suggested that gardening leave could last up to a year.
“Sue Gray moving into Starmer’s office is no surprise,” Nadine Dorries, Johnson’s former culture secretary, wrote on Twitter. “Grey’s report is a stitch of [Johnson].”
Gray’s new role will involve preparing Labor for government if it wins the next general election, the latest to be held in January 2025.
Starmer’s move to appoint an experienced Whitehall figure to the leading role mirrors Sir Tony Blair’s decision to bring in Jonathan Powell, a diplomat, as chief of staff before the party leader went on to lead Labor to victory in the 1997 general election.
After 13 years in opposition, most former ministers and advisers in the last Labor government are no longer at the political forefront. “He’s great. He will be excellent in that role,” said one veteran Labor MP.
One Tory MP, also a long-time Johnson ally, rejected the idea of bias in the partygate report and said Gray had been “very professional” as a public servant. “I think if people read the report properly, they will understand that they are saying that Boris was dumped [by civil servants],” he said.
Figures released on Thursday from the Electoral Commission show that Labor will receive £6 million from private donors in 2022, the highest figure outside a general election year since 2008. In the last quarter, the party raised a total of £7.2 million, while the ruling Conservatives received £4.7m in the same period.