23h ago
08.33 BST
Former top civil servant who worked under Raab
dismisses 'activists' claim
Simon McDonald has denied Dominic Raab’s claims there
were civil service “activists” in the Foreign Office and said those who worked
under the former minister “worked very hard for him”.
Lord
McDonald was permanent secretary under Raab when he was foreign secretary and
worked closely with the former deputy prime minister.
McDonald
told the BBC’s Today programme that he disagreed with his former boss and said
there was no “separate civil service agenda” and he saw no evidence of a “group
of activists trying to undermine a minister”.
Asked for
his characterisation of Raab’s behaviour while he was at the Foreign Office, he
said:
I witnessed
a tough task master, I witnessed a minister who knew what he wanted to do, and
frankly I witnessed somebody whose methods did not help him achieve what he
wanted to do and that I raised with him more than once.
When
McDonald raised these issues with Raab he said the characterisation was
“disputed” by the MP for Esher and Walton.
McDonald
added that the high threshold for submitting a formal complaint against
ministers meant civil servants were reluctant to put their names to specific
grievances.
Without
that evidence, Mr Raab was able to deflect. He said, and in a way reasonably,
‘What is the evidence?’.
And without
being able to present names and particular detailed instances, he resisted my
representations.
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