A senior civil servant has launched an attack on
Sir Philip Rutnam, the Home Office’s former top official, for “declaring war” on Priti Patel, accusing him of having “undermined the integrity” of his profession.
In an interview with The Telegraph, the mandarin said they had witnessed officials openly undermining Ms Patel in meetings, having apparently “disagreed with what she was trying to do”.
The official witnessed the minister becoming “frustrated” but said they never witnessed “bullying”. The senior Whitehall figure, who has served under both Labour and Conservative governments, said the “normal process” in Whitehall would have seen Sir Philip take a new role if he and Ms Patel could not work together.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official said: “He should have been saying, ‘you’re the democratically elected Home Secretary and it’s me who’s got to go.’ I think it sets a dangerous precedent – senior civil servants trying to take down a democratically elected minister. Even if her behaviour was bad you just do not do this.”
The extraordinary intervention from a serving mandarin comes after
Sir Philip resigned last weekend with a broadside against Ms Patel, alleging “shouting and swearing, belittling people, making unreasonable and repeated demands”.
Sir Philip has started legal proceedings against the Government.
The official said: “I was astounded at how Philip has presented this. For me it just crossed so many lines for senior civil servants.
“When a new minister comes in you’re building a new relationship. Sometimes those relationships work, sometimes they don’t. Convention is that if they don’t you simply accept that as the senior civil servant you move to a different part of the civil service.”
The mandarin also criticised Sir Mark Sedwill, the Cabinet Secretary, for apparently failing to resolve the dispute.
In his statement Sir Philip revealed that Sir Mark had, “on behalf of the Prime Minister”, asked him to “effect a reconciliation” with Ms Patel.
In the past week Ms Patel has faced claims that she bullied staff at the Department for International Development as well as at the Home Office and during her time as a work and pensions minister.
But the mandarin, who has worked with Ms Patel during her time in Cabinet, said: “I got the sense in … meetings that she was facing opposition from her officials, who disagreed with what she was trying to do. I found it extraordinary that in a meeting with another department her officials were trying to ‘correct’ her openly.
“I would have had the conversation afterwards. I wouldn’t have undermined my secretary of state in front of another department’s officials. I saw her get frustrated in meetings. I don’t think it was bullying – it was frank and direct.”
The official said they had been motivated to speak out as
they felt the integrity of the senior civil service was at stake. The mandarin added it appeared Sir Philip “therefore has declared war on his boss”.
They said: “There is not a lot of support among the senior civil servants I speak to for how he has handled it. He presented it as the noble thing but it was exactly the opposite.”
The official added that the top tier of the civil service had been “slow to recognise that this is a very different type of administration”, with “a large majority – a very clear mandate from the people”.
They added: “I don’t think a lot of senior civil servants have understood the scale of change.”
Representatives of Sir Philip were contacted for comment.
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