Andrew Gwynne MP registers “parliamentary adviser” role

1. Andrew Gwynne, the Labour MP for Denton and Reddish, has made a new disclosure on the latest update of the register of MPs’ financial interests, as at 17 October 2022.
2. There, under category 8, Mr Gwynne says: “From 27 June 2021, Parliamentary Adviser to Friends of the British Overseas Territories, a charity that raises raise awareness of the British Overseas Territories amongst parliamentarians. This is an unpaid role. (Registered 17 October 2022)”
3. On 11 October 2022, I revealed Mr Gwynne’s then undisclosed “parliamentary adviser” role. I’d contacted the senior MP for comment, prior to publication. But Mr Gwynne didn’t respond to requests for comment.
4. Mr Gwynne’s new disclosure appears to be a tacit acknowledgement of his failure to register the post until now.

Jack Doyle joins lobbying firm acting for William Hill

1. On 18 July 2022, Headland Consultancy, a communications consultancy, announced the recruitment of Jack Doyle, former director of communications at 10 Downing Street (screen shot in Figure 1). Mr Doyle resigned from Number 10 in February this year.

Figure 1. Headland recruits Jack Doyle

2. Headland is a registered consultant lobbyist. Its current clients in that role include William Hill, the gambling giant, according to the statutory Register of Consultant Lobbyists, which is maintained by the Office of the Registrar of Consultant Lobbyists (“ORCL”). ORCL defines consultant lobbying as lobbying of ministers and permanent secretaries on behalf of a third party, in return for payment.
3. On 7 July 2022, Chris Philp MP stepped down as gambling minister. In his resignation letter to the prime minister, Mr Philp wrote: “The Gambling Review is with No 10 at the moment for final approval, containing strong measures to protect people from the ravages of gambling addiction. I have met with the families of those who have committed suicide as a result of gambling addiction, and I strongly urge you to deliver the review in full and undiluted.”
4. The government launched its review of gambling back in December 2020, but the gambling review white paper has been repeatedly delayed. The government has still not published its white paper.
5. Nevertheless Mr Philp’s resignation letter shows Number 10 has received the white paper in a form the then gambling minister considers to be ready for publication. In other words, Number 10 is sitting on the long-awaited review.
6. Which brings us back to Mr Doyle and Headland. On 19 October 2022, the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (“ACOBA”) finally published its advice letter to the ex-director of communications at Number 10 for his new role with the communications consultancy. There ACOBA gives two reasons it is confident information held by Mr Doyle is unlikely to be useful to Headland and its clients.
7. First, ACOBA is reassured by the fact that as director of communications Mr Doyle would have had “access to policy information shortly before publication/announcement, on a reactive basis”.
8. Second, four months have elapsed since he left government.
9. Together, both reasons “lower the risk that the information Mr Doyle holds is still current and likely to benefit his prospective employer”.
10. Yet, as we know, Number 10 is sitting on its long-delayed gambling white paper.
11. The ACOBA advice letter makes clear Mr Doyle won’t be “lobbying or influencing government” in his new role – as is required by the government’s business appointment rules.
12. The gambling review continues to be an opaque and drawn-out process. But one thing is clear: with much at stake (geddit?) for all parties, Number 10 has been and continues to be involved. The white paper has been “imminent” for a long time, so gambling reform was a live issue when Mr Doyle left the government. Thus the former Number 10 staffer surely possesses information useful to William Hill.
13. When asked for comment, Mr Doyle said in an email: “’I have had no contact with William Hill since starting at Headland. I am also bound by a strict duty of confidentiality from my time in No10 and any suggestion I have broken that is untrue.”

Conservative Environment Network: why the silence on the grant from “Greener UK 19-20”?

1. The Conservative Environment Network (“CEN”) styles itself as “the independent forum for Conservatives in the UK and around the world who support net zero, nature restoration, and resource security”. Its chair is Ben Goldsmith, the well-known financier and environmentalist (see 3 May 2022 post).
2. CEN is a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee, whose latest accounts are made up to 30 June 2021. There the related-party disclosures note says: “During the period the company received a grant from Greener UK 19-20 amounting to £20k.”
3. Unable to find an entity called “Greener UK 19-20”, I wondered whether “19-20” referred to the financial year. I emailed CEN for clarification, but the influential organisation didn’t respond.
4. Meanwhile, there is an entity called Greener UK, which is “a coalition of 12 major environmental organisations, with a combined public membership of over 8 million”. The Greener UK unit, headed by Sarah Williams, “works on behalf of Greener UK, co-ordinating and driving forward the coalition’s work”.
5. Unable to find evidence Greener UK is a grant-making body, I called Ms Williams. Greener UK doesn’t award grants, she confirmed. We duly agreed I’d email my query about the disclosure in the latest CEN accounts.
6. Ms Williams, though, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
7. Given the silence from the head of the Greener UK unit, I emailed Shaun Spiers, who chairs the board of Greener UK. I heard nothing from Mr Spiers, either.

Hawthorn Advisors and Quintessentially were linked while Ben Elliot was Tory co-chair

1. The lobbying firm co-founded by Ben Elliot was linked to his luxury concierge service for the super-rich while he was Tory fundraiser and co-chair.
2. Mr Elliot, who stepped down from his role with the Conservative Party on 5 September 2022, founded consultant lobbyist Hawthorn Advisors with John Evans in 2013. After being appointed Tory co-chair in 2019, Mr Elliot resigned the following year as a director of the consultant lobbyist and put his Hawthorn shares in a trust.
3. On 27 January 2021, I revealed that Ruth Kennedy, also known as Lady Dundas, owns Mr Elliot’s Hawthorn shares in the trust. Ms Kennedy appeared on the Hawthorn website as a “board advisor”, but then vanished (see 27 January 2021 post).
4. Among other roles, Ms Kennedy is a director of Value Retail PLC, which runs The Bicester Collection, “eleven luxury shopping destinations in Europe and China”. She is also a member of the “Value Retail Global Advisory Board” (screen shot in Figure 1).

Figure 1. Ruth Kennedy is a member of the “Value Retail Global Advisory Board”

5. As Tory co-chair, Mr Elliot continued as a director of Quintessentially, the concierge service he co-founded in 2000.
6. Quintessentially is an official partner of The Bicester Collection (screen shot in Figure 2). This means the concierge service is or was linked to Hawthorn Advisors via Ms Kennedy. In other words, there wasn’t a clear separation between Quintessentially and the consultant lobbyist.

Figure 2. Quintessentially is an official partner of The Bicester Collection

7. On 4 August 2021, The Guardian newspaper quoted a spokesperson for Hawthorn: “Ben has been an investor in Hawthorn since 2013, long before he took up his unpaid position as chairman of the Conservative Party. He has never been actively involved in the business. Ben’s shares are in trust and he remains entirely removed from the business.”
8. Yet, as I wrote on 27 January 2021, as the owner of Mr Elliot’s Hawthorn shares in a trust, Ms Kennedy is acting in his interest with his authority. In addition, she is or was a “board advisor”. Mr Elliot is or was therefore hardly uninvolved at Hawthorn while Ms Kennedy is or was a “board advisor”.
9. What’s more, here I have shown another way Mr Elliot was not “entirely removed” from Hawthorn Advisors while he was Tory co-chair: the link between the lobbying firm and Quintessentially.
10. A Hawthorn event that took place in September 2021 at Braemar, Scotland shows Ms Kennedy was involved with the lobbying firm at the time. The “luxury branding and marketing consultant” was a member of the organising committee for the two-day Braemar Summit (screen shot in Figure 3).

Figure 3. Braemar Summit 2021: Ruth Kennedy was a member of the organising committee

11. Meanwhile, the chancellor’s tax-cutting mini-budget on 23 September 2022 contained good news for The Bicester Collection and the rest of the members of Walpole, the trade body for UK luxury (screen shot in Figure 4) (see 4 May 2022 post). Namely, the government is to bring back tax-free shopping for overseas visitors to the UK.

Figure 4. The Bicester Collection is a member of Walpole

12. Walpole that day hailed the chancellor’s decision in a statement on its website.
13. For the avoidance of doubt, Quintessentially isn’t a Walpole member – or at least it isn’t listed as such on the trade body website.
14. Hawthorn Advisors has been acting for Walpole since the period October to December 2021, according to the statutory Register of Consultant Lobbyists, which is maintained by the Office of the Registrar of Consultant Lobbyists (“ORCL”). ORCL defines consultant lobbying as lobbying of ministers and permanent secretaries on behalf of a third party, in return for payment.

Figure 5. Sarah Sands is a partner at Hawthorn Advisors

15. The lobbying firm and Walpole are connected via journalist Sarah Sands, who is both a Hawthorn partner (screen shot in Figure 5) and board member at the trade body (screen shot in Figure 6). Small world!

Figure 6. Sarah Sands is a board member at Walpole

16. There’s no suggestion that anyone has done anything illegal.
17. Mr Evans and Mr Elliot didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Two senior MPs fail to register “parliamentary adviser” role

1. Two senior MPs, one Labour and the other Conservative, are formally named as “parliamentary advisers” at a charity – yet both have failed to register their other role on the register of MPs’ financial interests.
2. The latest accounts for Friends of the British Overseas Territories (“FOTBOT”), made up to 31 March 2021, list Andrew Gwynne MP and Andrew Rosindell MP as “parliamentary advisers”. The accounts were received at the Charity Commission on 31 January 2022.
3. The FOTBOT website, too, shows both MPs in that role (screen shot in Figure 1).

Figure 1. “Parliamentary advisers”: Friends of the British Overseas Territories website at 8 October 2022

4. This raises three issues for the pair.
5. First, what exactly is each MP doing as “parliamentary adviser”?
6. Second, is the job paid or unpaid?
7. Third, why have both failed to register the role on the register of MPs’ financial interests? If the post is unpaid, I believe it should be disclosed under category 8, “miscellaneous” (see 24 September 2022 post).
8. Meanwhile, the latest update of the register of MPs’ financial interests, as at 3 October 2022, shows FOTBOT paid for Mr Gwynne’s flights and accommodation (value: £414.92) for a three-day trip to Gibraltar last month. Purpose of visit: “A parliamentary delegation to Gibraltar as a British overseas territory to celebrate Gibraltar National Day.” This most recent disclosure only reinforces the need for the Labour MP for Denton and Reddish to register the role on the register of MPs’ financial interests.
9. Mr Rosindell, the Conservative MP for Romford, is chair of the British overseas territories all-party parliamentary group (“APPG”).
10. Mr Gwynne and Mr Rosindell didn’t respond to requests for comment.

New gambling minister runs company with owner of JOE Media whose podcast is sponsored by Coral

1. The new gambling minister runs a company with the owner of a leading online publisher whose podcast is sponsored by a major gambling firm.
2. On 8 July 2022, Damian Collins, the Conservative MP for Folkestone and Hythe, was appointed gambling minister, succeeding colleague Chris Philp MP. The role sits under the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (“DCMS”).
3. Mr Collins is a founding partner at Infotagion LLP, “an independent fact-checking service”. The role is unpaid and requires “10 hours per month”, according to the register of MPs’ financial interests.
4. David Sefton, another founding partner, also remains in post. Mr Sefton is “a venture capital investor and public company director with longstanding technology experience”, the Infotagion website says.
5. Incorporated on 31 March 2020, Infotagion styles itself on its website as “the independent, expert fact-checking service for Coronavirus (COVID-19)”. Surprisingly, the first accounts, made up to 31 March 2021, are long overdue: they should have been filed by 31 December 2021. What’s more, the company was warned for the second time at the end of August that it would be struck off at Companies House and dissolved in not less than two months, “unless cause is shown to the contrary”. Not a good look all round for any company, let alone one controlled partly by a minister!
6. In 2020, Mr Sefton’s Greencastle Capital took over JOE Media, a “male-focused” – its description – online publisher. Much JOE content is sports-related, particularly football.
7. JOE publishes a podcast, “All To Play For”. Presented by former England footballer Joe Cole, it is sponsored by Coral, one of the UK’s biggest bookmakers (screen shot in Figure 1). Coral is part of the Entain Group.

Figure 1. “All To Play For” podcast sponsored by Coral: JOE website at 5 October 2022

8. For the avoidance of doubt, Mr Collins has nothing to do with JOE. Nevertheless he runs a company with the online publisher’s owner. Thus the gambling minister is potentially conflicted given Mr Sefton’s JOE works with the gambling industry.
9. What’s more, Mr Collins’ responsibilities as a DCMS minister extend far beyond gambling (screen shot in Figure 2). As minister for “tech and the digital economy”, Mr Collins covers other policy areas – online advertising, for example – relevant to Mr Sefton and his business activities. There is a risk of more potential conflicts of interest for the new minister, therefore.

Figure 2. Minister for tech and the digital economy – responsibilities: DCMS website at 5 October 2022

10. When asked for comment, Mr Collins said in an email: “Infotagion is not a trading company. It has no income and I do not receive any economic benefit from it. Neither the Infotagion podcast nor website are revenue generating. I have never had any involvement in the management of Joe Media nor any stake in that business.”
11. The senior MP went on: “When I was appointed as a minister I declared to the department my directorship of Infotagion, my role as host of the Infotagion podcast and that David Sefton was someone I know. I also sought advice on these from the Permanent Secretary. I have recently received that advice and have informed Infotagion that I wish to resign as a director and will be unable to continue to present the podcast [although we have not recorded any since my appointment as a Minister].”

The Times reports my Ian Rush ad story

1. On 1 October 2022, Martyn Ziegler, chief sports reporter, reported in The Times newspaper my Ian Rush ad story (see 23 September 2022 post).
2. Mr Ziegler’s report (“Rush to market”) appeared in his Sport Notebook column: https://dralexmay.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/the-times-1-oct-2022.pdf.