John Glen

Sachin Savur (SS): You were appointed as a parliamentary under-secretary in DCMS [the Department for Culture, Media and Sport] in 2017 – what was the conversation you had with the prime minister when you were appointed?

John Glen (JG): Well, I didn’t have a conversation with the prime minister. I remember being in a meeting room in One George Street, the Institution of Civil Engineers, and I was called up by either Julian Smith [then deputy chief whip] or Gavin Barwell [then Downing Street chief of staff], who asked me if I would join the government and do DCMS. And everyone thought I was going to do civil society taking over from Rob Wilson, who had just lost his seat in Reading, but it wasn’t that – they moved the configuration around, so I was doing arts, heritage and tourism, and I remember being absolutely elated. I was like, “yes!” – you can think about it, seven years I’d been an MP, I’d seen many of my intake literally come and go from office. You know, Nicky Morgan had sort of stepped down and became chair of the Treasury select committee after the election, having been in the cabinet and left.

So I was absolutely thrilled. I spent five years as a PPS [parliamentary private secretary] – three years for Eric Pickles [then communities and local government secretary], a year with Sajid [Javid] at BIS [the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills] as it was then, and then a year with Philip Hammond [then chancellor of the exchequer], which had been a natural staging post to become a minister –  the last job they can give you as PPS is to the chancellor. So I knew I was on a good thing when Theresa [May] won in 2017. I was disappointed not to be made a whip in 2015 and very upset in 2016 not to have made it as a minister.

But then I finally started there, so I was really thrilled. It didn’t feel a natural fit for me, but I was just determined I was going to make the best of it. And Eric Pickles said to me once “treat every day as a minister as if it’s your last”, which I tried to do throughout my seven years. Because you just know that you’ve got some levers over power and I was determined to make the best of it.

SS: It sounds like you were quite ready to become a minister before you did.

JG: Yeah, very much so. I mean, I remember saying to my two very close friends, Gary Streeter and Michael Bates [former Conservative MPs, for whom Glen worked as a parliamentary researcher], that in 2010 I’d achieved it, I’m satisfied. But very quickly that sort of flows away – I joined the defence select committee for two years, which I thoroughly enjoyed, and I enjoy being on the Treasury select committee now. 

But it wasn’t going to be a permanent fix and you know, as you become more familiar, you begin to think, ‘well, I could do that’. I became a PPS in September 2012, which I enjoyed. And then obviously every reshuffle you’re hoping you’re going to be called up, and it’s just the way psychologically it works.

SS:  Was there anything in particular that you learned from being PPS or on the select committee that was helpful as a minister?

JG: Yeah, I call it an apprenticeship really, being a PPS. To do it for five years for three cabinet ministers was longer than most. But nowadays people come in here and they expect to be a minister straight away, and I think it’s very regrettable. I found observing what Eric did, looking at the dynamics with other ministers, looking at what was a good minister, what was a bad minister, people who were good at the media but bad at handling civil servants, good in the chamber but bad at handling colleagues – all these things contribute to what it takes to be a good minister.

“nowadays people come in here and they expect to be a minister straight away, and I think it’s very regrettable.”

And also I saw the brutal unfairness of it, really. Eric had been a minister for five years and had, I think, done a pretty good job in difficult circumstances – he brought in planning reforms, had to deal with significant cuts to local government, and was seen as a very steady hand, a good egg. And I think he lost his position because, unexpectedly probably, we won a majority in 2015 – George Osborne was never that, I didn’t feel, that supportive of him, and probably thought it was an opportunity to bring in some fresh blood. Which is again, what happens – he was dispatched with a knighthood. And you know, you also realise that no ministerial career, or at least very few, go on for very long.

Ben Paxton (BP): You then moved on to be economic secretary to the Treasury in 2018, responsible for financial services. How helpful was it for you in that role that you had a background working in business?

JG: In retrospect, it was helpful. 

I loved, by the way, arts, heritage and tourism. I visited 114 venues around the country – still in this office up here I’ve got a number of the things I’ve picked up from arts institutions around the country. And it was such a privilege, I’d go around and everywhere I’d go, I’d go to a tourism venue, then I’d go to an arts and then a heritage venue. I loved it because I was new, and I took it very seriously. 

But when I was rung from my lower ministerial corridor, the sort of cell block off the members’ lobby, and I was called up by Julian Smith, who must have been the chief whip by then – he asked me to move, and that was January 2018. It was like going from museums to MiFID [the European Union’s Markets in Financial Instruments Directive] in one step. I think it was the most extreme move – literally, during the first week in January 2018 I was visiting the Hive in Worcester and visiting a converted church, and literally 10 days later I was sat with the financial directors of seven or eight European banks in the City trying to explain to them what the options were with Brexit. 

And in those early weeks in the Treasury, I felt quite overwhelmed. I felt ‘gosh, this is so intense’, and about seven or eight weeks in I had the Novichok in Salisbury [the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Glen’s constituency]. So I was literally doing bill committee with Alan Duncan [then a Foreign Office minister] for some legislation and then I was going down in the gap in the lunchtime to do media on Novichok, so it was really testing my resilience. 

I think having an MBA, having been a strategy consultant – I’ve never worked directly in financial services, but it did give me plausibility, which probably helped my confidence. And then with the work ethic and just the great pleasure to be working with Philip Hammond again, it was a real buzz. And I was again determined – there was a lot going on in 2018, we were very uncertain what sort of Brexit it was going to look like. I went to Malaysia, Indonesia and Japan in September of that year. The government was in a real state over how it was going to do Brexit without a majority. But I was just trying to be the steady hand on the tiller, really.

“in those early weeks in the Treasury, I felt quite overwhelmed. I felt ‘gosh, this is so intense’”

There was a lot to learn. There’s banking, financial institutions, insurance, interfacing with the regulator. I saw Andrew Bailey, now governor of the Bank of England, every six weeks when he was at the FCA [Financial Conduct Authority]. I saw Sam Woods at the PRA [Prudential Regulatory Authority] as well, on a regular basis. Quite complicated stuff. And then there was all the financial inclusion piece – so there’s banking, access to cash, bank branches.

And of course, as a junior minister, you do a lot of Westminster Hall debates as well. So I remember in the first week I had to replace Liz Truss on something to do with child tax credits because she was chief secretary and of course, chief secretaries, as I later found out, don’t do Westminster Hall debates.

So I took it very seriously. It was hard work but I think certainly, having a plausible background helped me feel confident, increasingly as time progressed, in doing the job well.

BP: Given everything that was going on at that time and the external-facing role that you had, was there anything you did that helped you get on top of your brief when having to respond to things?

JG: Well, it is through intense immersion and hard work and experience accumulated over time that you become familiar. There’s a rhythm of meetings – for example, every January there’s a meeting with the market makers and the pension funds about how gilts should be issued. 

“it is through intense immersion and hard work and experience accumulated over time that you become familiar.”

And you feel in the Treasury that you’re part of a well-oiled machine – the quality of the civil servants, people in my private office were superb. Typically they had first-class degrees from Oxbridge – not that that’s the summit of human achievement, and I don’t have a first-class degree from Oxford – but they were super bright, super helpful, super attentive.

And of course, the stakeholders I was dealing with were some of the most well-paid people in the country, within an industry that we are world leaders in. So I had to be well-briefed and capable of answering questions.

BP: You were in that post for four and a half years. Was that continuity helpful when you were working with the financial services sector, and could you give us an example of where that really helped you in what was quite a difficult role?

JG: Yeah. I think it was, in retrospect, brilliant for the role to have one person in it.

I mean, in July ’19, when my dear friend Sajid Javid became chancellor, which I was thrilled about – I wasn’t an early supporter of Boris Johnson, but I sort of folded in behind him to support Sajid becoming chancellor – we’d been activists together in the late ’90s in Lewisham. And I was keen to carry on because there was a lot more to do and obviously we were getting to the conclusion with Brexit, whatever that was going to look like as we move towards an election. 

“I’d passed my record [as longest-serving economic secretary] that month. You know, amazingly, it was less than four years, was the record.”

As 2020 progressed, there was a modest reshuffle in February 2020 and Steve Barclay came in [as chief secretary to the Treasury], which I felt was fair enough, because his job had expired with the Brexit secretary role completed. I didn’t have a problem with that. I found it more challenging when Simon Clarke took over in September ’21 – I’d passed my record [as longest-serving economic secretary] that month. You know, amazingly, it was less than four years, was the record. 

So I was disappointed. And I asked Rishi [Sunak, then chancellor of the exchequer] if I could be made minister of state. And he had a word with the prime minister who said yes, that would be appropriate. But this is one of the bizarre things of the system, which I’m happy to put on record now, that in order to secure minister of state status, I had to give up my parliamentary under-secretary salary. And I was never paid as a minister thereafter. Because I thought it would be good to be made a minister of state – so I was put in one of the windowless offices on the ministerial corridor, reflecting my status as a minister of state. But I lost my salary.

SS: And did that change how you approached the role at all?

JG: Well, no, it didn’t change the way I approached the role, but I did find it bizarre how our system worked. I have grown-up stepchildren and financially I was secure and probably Rishi knew that and he wanted to help – I don’t blame him, but it was just the way it was.

“I never had a ministerial salary again – so no one can accuse me of doing it for all the extra privileges of office!”

And then subsequently when I left government in July ’22 and then came back, I assumed I’d get a salary and nobody ever told me that I’d then just been portered into the cabinet as an unpaid minister. And subsequently, when I became paymaster general, nobody ever thought to ask if I wanted a salary and I think I was probably seen as so compliant and loyal that you could just get away with it. So I never had a ministerial salary again – so no one can accuse me of doing it for all the extra privileges of office!

BP: You mentioned there when that record time as economic secretary came to an end – that was during quite a turbulent period again at the fall of the Boris Johnson government. Was that a difficult decision for you? 

JG: It was a very difficult decision.

BP: And you mentioned working with Rishi Sunak and Sajid Javid – did those resignations influence your decision at all?

JG: I mean, I felt Sajid shouldn’t have left office [as chancellor in February 2020]. I think he should have had a reset moment with the prime minister and given up one of his spads [special advisers] and tried to retain office. I think it was a job that he was well-suited for and I liked him immensely, and I still do as a human being and as a man of integrity. But I think he felt Dominic Cummings [then chief adviser to the prime minister] – his attitude to government was constantly hostile. 

I don’t necessarily disagree with some of Dominic Cummings’s assessments of government. But where he lacks so obviously is in any patience or capacity to deal with human realities. And you know, he is a sort of keyboard warrior and is always angry – and that doesn’t get things done. And clearly he was trying to influence the decision of who the governor of the Bank of England would be – he thought that it should be his decision, essentially. Because he treated the proceedings for, as far as I can see, all ministers, MPs and even the prime minister with utter contempt as he tried to forge a revolution, but nothing could be done quickly enough or radically enough.

“I don’t necessarily disagree with some of Dominic Cummings’s assessments of government. But where he lacks so obviously is in any patience or capacity to deal with human realities.”

And so I felt Sajid’s resignation was very, very regrettable, and I was glad he returned to government subsequently. But Rishi, was obviously hugely capable. I had interviewed Rishi in the summer of 2014 to be a member of parliament, and he subsequently very quickly got selected in an ultra-safe seat. He was a very capable individual and I thought we were in good hands, although I thought he had a very steep learning curve. We spoke in those early days and I was very loyal and close to him throughout his time. In the second calendar quarter of 2022, the whole thing about the non-dom thing blew up [when it was revealed that Rishi Sunak’s wife, Akshata Murty, was treated as non-domiciled for UK tax purposes] when I was in Washington, wheresoever that came from.

I never saw Rishi speak ill of the prime minister, ever. I mean, he might raise his eyebrows, but he never spoke ill of him. He was trying to reconcile his sense of duty to serve his prime minister who had appointed him with an increasing recognition, I think, that he was just sort of randomly moving from one shopping aisle to the other, not really knowing what he wanted or which direction he was going. And I think in the end, coupled with the sort of political judgments and the lack of grip that the prime minister Boris Johnson had on various agendas of government and the contradictions in his policy, Rishi decided in early July to resign. 

And I had a conversation with him the day after, and I said “I’m happy to go” – I felt very loyal to my officials, to the agenda of work, and on my desk was a draft of the Financial Services and Markets Bill, so the legislation that was really going to underpin the transition – I had taken legislation through the previous year, but this was going to be the key document, and I felt a lot of the work had been done. So with a heavy heart, I felt that it would be wrong for me to continue in office, really continuing my own political career whilst others were making sacrifices to achieve what at that time I very reluctantly felt was inevitable and necessary – a new leader.

“I was happy to go on the backbenches, I really was. I felt like I’d behaved as honourably as I could.”

So I did resign. I found it very hard and I’d obviously had a long tenure. But for me to do so, it wasn’t a calculated attempt and I was totally reconciled in this, as events unfolded, that Rishi wasn’t going to win. And I was happy to go on the backbenches, I really was. I felt like I’d behaved as honourably as I could.

And then obviously events unfolded and I found myself back in office. We’d never had a conversation, Rishi and I, about what job I might or might not have. In September when we had a quick coffee in Portcullis House, I said “would you have given me a job had you won?” and he said “I would have done, but I’m not telling you what it was”, and so that was how it was left. And I was one of the last to be appointed to the cabinet, and I thought it was likely given my experience that I would be made chief secretary and I was obviously extremely pleased to return to the Treasury, and to return to a role where I felt I’d built up an understanding of what it involved. And supporting Jeremy Hunt [chancellor of the exchequer, 2022–24], somebody who I didn’t know well at all actually, but I had a lot of respect for as a sort of operator who needed to calm things down.

BP: Moving on to your time as chief secretary – you’d been at the Treasury, but City minister and chief secretary are quite different roles. What were some of the really striking differences for you returning to the Treasury but in a different ministerial role?

JG: With the City minister role, I had an enormous amount of engagement with people. I was talking to leaders of financial institutions, regulators, I was going to CityUK [a financial services industry advocacy group] chairman breakfasts, I was speaking at ABI [Association of British Insurers] conferences. I was constantly out there, which I enjoyed. I got to know these stakeholders and the people who lobbied from CityUK, UK Finance [a financial services trade association], the StepChange debt charity, ABCUL [the Association of British Credit Unions], the Association of Foreign Banks, all of them, quite well.

“one of Gove’s loyal aides or somebody briefing against me and the classic sort of game playing that you get at that level ... all felt a bit bizarre to me.”

And so the most immediate difference was that I wasn’t doing Westminster Hall debates anymore, but also I wasn’t actually responsible for that relationship management. So I was dealing with more officials to say ‘how are we going to manage Michael Gove’s [then secretary of state for levelling up, housing and communities] rather random spending plans when he hadn’t spent the money he said he was going to spend in the previous spending review?’. And, you know, one of Gove’s loyal aides or somebody briefing against me and the classic sort of game playing that you get at that level, which all felt a bit bizarre to me. 

For the first time I had a special adviser, who was somebody who worked for me, an excellent guy called Dr Mark McClelland, who’d worked for me for the previous five years in Salisbury. He was a natural choice and was very equipped to do the job.

But I felt I was much more closely working with my officials, because obviously things were very tight – we couldn’t allow any more latitude in terms of spending. I think sometimes though, I felt a little bit superfluous in that I was always in the room with every conversation, but wasn’t the one driving it. And my formula was always to say no to extra money and in some areas that was really challenging. 

“I felt a little bit superfluous in that I was always in the room with every conversation, but wasn’t the one driving it.”

October ’22 to November ’23 was a really, really difficult time where interest rates were high as inflation needed to be taken out of the system. And the public finances were significantly harmed by – not in short-term terms, the mini-budget, that was about the credibility and stewardship – but what was really driving it was the fact that we’d had an enormous amount of borrowing. And the cost of servicing that borrowing meant that the classic narrative that Liz Truss had irresponsibly courted and made people feel was sustainable, with tax cuts and a dash for growth, was totally unsustainable. But politically, the expectations had been raised and therefore we were always going to find it very difficult to fulfil them.

BP: You talked about relationships and managing different cabinet ministers – how did you go about developing relationships with those people you didn’t know so well? And you hadn’t served as a minister in a big spending department – how did you go about navigating that?

JG: Well, obviously my DCMS experience had been brief and it’s not a big spender. So, I think being professional – I was surprised that some cabinet ministers really didn’t have the grip on their numbers, because they were more interested in being on GB News and positioning themselves for what they thought might come afterwards, than actually really trying to do the job well. That I found bizarre, but I also found it reflected my own perhaps naivety about how brutal politics can be – that scaling that ladder involves an eye to your media brand and image, not just your level of competence. And on reflection now, I think I was always seen as that safe, perhaps slightly dull, pair of hands rather than somebody who you would want to give a big high-profile job to.

“I was surprised that some cabinet ministers really didn’t have the grip on their numbers, because they were more interested on being on GB News”

Nonetheless, if you look back now, probably people in the City would say, ‘well, John knew what he was doing as City minister and did a decent job’. But that is not really valued because you need to sort of cut through and reach audiences beyond Westminster. So I think I’m self aware enough to know that I was never going to be prime minister, and nor did I really seek to.

But I suppose in dealing with some of my colleagues, they were good and confident in the media but their grasp sometimes of what was going on, I felt, was less assured – for some of them. 

SS: Can I just go back to what you said about feeling a bit superfluous in some meetings – was there anything you did to try and overcome that, and figure out how to add value?

JG: Well, I mean it was difficult because in a way I was there to control public spending. And therefore, I could contribute on the arbitration of different choices, but essentially my challenge was to reconcile the short, medium and long term.

And so I had another turn in the Cabinet Office doing infected blood compensation, which I didn’t anticipate. I mean, in July, I was given to believe that the Times had been briefed by someone very close to the prime minister that I was nailed down to be the next defence secretary. Which – given my constituency interests, and I’d done the Royal College of Defence Studies course in 2014–15, and I’d been on the defence committee – I felt wasn’t an unrealistic prospect. And Salisbury, obviously, was the home of the army and has got a lot of military connections. And I probably allowed that to get carried away because, you know, the political editor of the Times was absolutely adamant that’s what was going to happen – until I was called up by someone else very close to the prime minister at the end of August, who said “It’s not going to happen. It’s going to be Grant Shapps”. 

“a note was passed to me by my private secretary saying ‘the prime minister wants to see you’, which I knew meant I was being moved.”

So Grant duly got the job and I was quite disappointed. And then I was reconciled to staying in the Treasury and I thought, ‘well, I’ll have had two years as chief secretary’ – at that time we thought the election probably would be in the autumn of 2024. And then after the Remembrance Day service – which was a great privilege to be part of, and I did it twice – the next day I was preparing for Treasury questions and a note was passed to me by my private secretary saying ‘the prime minister wants to see you’, which I knew meant I was being moved.

And that was the sort of last round, and I could have left the government then – I’m sure I would have been recognised in the normal way. But I was offered the position of paymaster general, and I took that job really because I could see ahead that I was going to be loyal to Rishi till whatever the end was. I mean, I hoped we would do quite a lot better and we’d have most of that year, but I could see that small boats issue was becoming more and more complicated legally and Robert Jenrick’s [immigration minister, 2022–23] departure had been, alongside so many others, so difficult.

So I’d then been given a great mandate and encouragement from Jeremy Hunt who said to me “you’ve got a moral responsibility to see this infected blood through”. We lost the vote in the first week of December in 2023 where Dame Diana Johnson had really pushed us [with an amendment compelling the government to set up a compensation scheme for the infected blood scandal], and also I was dealing with colleagues who’d just had enough – I remember Kevin Foster saying to me, “Sunak has to deliver”. And I thought, this just shows the enmity that we’ve got now. So people weren’t voting and so many proxy wars were going on with people, they’d felt they’d been slighted and hadn’t had the career trajectory they wanted.

“I felt that the opportunity for those eight months to deliver something operationally was really helpful to my own sense of having achieved something in office.”

So I knuckled down, appointed independent experts and then managed to get the infected blood compensation scheme up and running on the legislation before the House on Tuesday the 21st of May. The election was called the next day. It went through wash-up that week and the legislation was confirmed. I knew there would then need to be consultative work during the purdah period, which happened, and my successor Nick Thomas-Symonds accepted 69 of the 74 recommendations from that work and progress is still ongoing.

In retrospect, I felt that the opportunity for those eight months to deliver something operationally was really helpful to my own sense of having achieved something in office. Although I think my time as economic secretary, City minister, for four and a half years, will be probably what I’ll be known as.

BP: When you were chief secretary, there was industrial action going on at that time and one of the things the government did was implement the pay review bodies’ recommendations – but this would have also involved the chancellor, who had been health secretary, and the prime minister, who had previously been chancellor. What was your role in taking that forward and saying we should implement the pay review body recommendations in July 2023?

JG: In practice, the prime minister and the chancellor are driving the decisions and my job was almost to stand firm and to hold that together.

It is just a mischaracterisation to say that the chief secretary makes those decisions. Obviously if the prime minister wanted to make a deal, there’d be a lot of pressure. We were led by civil servants who were trying to help us reconcile the financial implications with the absolute reality of the destructive nature of the disruption to the service provision. So it was very, very hard to reconcile.

“what I felt very strongly was that the unions that were leading these conversations sensed blood.”

In the end, the chancellor and I had conversations with several of the big key spending cabinet ministers. We wanted to resolve them and we knew what the landing zone was – for example, education, schools. They all were happy to do it, but we did make them wash their own faces basically and pay for it from within their own budgets. And there were some adjustments to visa costs and things like that to make up some of the money in the Home Office, but that’s how we did it.

But what I felt very strongly was that the unions that were leading these conversations sensed blood. They were just trying to time us out and weren’t seriously interested in anything. And the trouble is that we got to that stage in the polls as well. I passionately believed that there should be some productivity conversations – for example, in the very strong trade union-dominated rail transport industry, we couldn’t make any meaningful changes stick. I mean, that is the truth. And consequently, the early decisions made by the incoming government in July, they were delighted to stop the strikes, but what expectations have they set and what have they received in return? But we lacked the authority despite the still significant nominal majority to deliver those changes.

BP: You mentioned productivity there – you were involved in the public sector productivity review that happened during that time.

JG: Well, in truth, it was gaining momentum just before I lost my position, so my successor took it forward. But there were real challenges. I mean, I remember going to a conference early in my time is paymaster general, it must have been January ’24, and I went to a conference in the QEII Centre and one of those word maps was put in, it said ‘what are you looking forward to this year?’. And ‘change of government’ was the biggest dominant thing on the screen. And it didn’t feel that anyone was really that constructive in trying to help us.

And I think the casual optimism of a change, no matter what it was or how lacking it was in terms of a plan, that was the dominant sentiment around Whitehall. So I felt we had nominal co-operation, but nobody seriously believed we were going to form another administration, and nor did I if I was honest.

BP: You worked under four different chancellors – what were some of the defining features of your relationship with each of them?

JG: I mean, Philip Hammond, I was his PPS for a year. And that was after the referendum when Theresa May became prime minister. I got on exceptionally well with him – you know, it’s a formal relationship, Philip was not really a political figure. I don’t think he ever wanted to be prime minister. He obviously spent time in the Foreign Office, he was defence secretary and transport secretary – he was a serious, hardworking, thoughtful, authentic Conservative, who I had a lot of respect for. And I tried to help him by bringing colleagues, young backbenchers like Rishi Sunak, alongside to explain why they wanted to do freeports, and why Treasury orthodoxy said it’s a displacement activity.

“I guess [Philip Hammond's] shortcoming was that he was almost sort of disinterested in the reality of politics.”

But I enjoyed him working with him immensely. He had a very dry sense of humour. I felt he was dealing with lots of fanciful things that were coming from No.10. He was very rational – so when Michael Gove wanted to put an arbitrary deadline on when we’d stop using diesel cars or whatever it was, Philip would challenge on the whole business logic and economic reality. And sometimes his perspective won the day, sometimes it didn’t, but he was a serious figure. I guess his shortcoming was that he was almost sort of disinterested in the reality of politics.

Then Sajid took over. Sajid was genuinely a personal friend – my sister used to babysit for his eldest when we were officers of East Lewisham Conservative Association, so we go back a long way. He had a great energy – similarly very high work ethic, slightly more political. Probably still had some ambition left in him having fought for the leadership that summer [in 2019] himself, but very much was on the rise. But time was rather short with him, and the election, though emphatic, soon after there were problems with Dominic Cummings really that were emerging.

BP: What was it like working someone who was a genuine friend but also the chancellor and your boss?

JG: Well, I felt like he was very confident in me handling the City stuff. But it was very short months between late July 2019 and the 13th of February in 2020, and you obviously had all the run-up to the election from about the 3rd or 4th of November till the 12th of December. I went to Sajid’s 50th birthday during the weekend, the Saturday after the election. There were only two other MPs there – Boris Johnson and Rob Halfon. So you know, I was very close to him, but it all unravelled very quickly, sadly.

I was close to Rishi but again, I think I became sort of ‘John’s this guy you can rely on in all seasons’, and I think the danger in politics is you need to keep moving forward. And I think probably looking back, I should have probably been more… I think I’d made it clear to him I’d want to be chief secretary one day and that obviously happened. What we were dealing with there with Bounce Back Loans [for businesses affected by the Covid-19 pandemic], Sunday night calls with the banks – of course, people try and rewrite history now, but there was no rule book. The furlough scheme, Eat Out to Help Out [a government subsidy scheme to encourage hospitality spending in summer 2020], which is now often seen as a reckless event, was all trying to keep the economy going. And I don’t think Rishi would have run it quite as he would have wished if he’d have been prime minister. And probably spent more than we wanted to. But you know, we were taken over by Michael Gove and Matt Hancock who had a different agenda, and just taking on the sort of the consensus that appeared to exist among scientists over the lockdown, which was so catastrophic for the borrowing levels required.

“I think I became sort of ‘John’s this guy you can rely on in all seasons’, and I think the danger in politics is you need to keep moving forward.”

And then after that, Jeremy Hunt, who I didn’t know well, but I had a lot of respect for. He was of the same ilk as Philip Hammond, really in terms of being professional, capable and so on. Which was wholly necessary after the debacle of the brief Liz Truss experiment. However, again, the problem he had was that you had with him and Oliver Dowden – who I appointed to the [Conservative] research department in 2004 – and Rishi, they were perceived to be very similar political personalities. And we lacked the sort of charismatic individual who was going to give us some narrative over what our next life looked like. 

And the hope that Rishi would be seen as a stable, sensible, competent individual was, I think lost when throughout 2023 we had a window of opportunity after the Windsor framework came through, which the party failed to unite behind. And then we had the report on Boris’s shenanigans, and three by-elections which were catastrophic. And then as you go into the autumn, I think it was then you had the Jenrick resignation and so on. So whenever he tried to gain momentum, he lost some. And then we had the MPs defecting just before the election and it was as if whatever he did, no matter how hard he worked, he tried to put people around him he could trust but I think everyone by that time was beginning to look at what was coming next. 

“I also regret very much our political culture doesn’t value successful affluent people because they are typically viewed with a degree of jealousy”

It’s very sad, because I think now we look back and say he was, and is, an incredibly capable individual who was in it for the right reasons. But politics needs a blend of personal qualities, handling the sort of people side and the vision side. I also regret very much our political culture doesn’t value successful affluent people because they are typically viewed with a degree of jealousy, if I’m honest, and I always say Rishi picked up the largest poisoned chalice in British politics ever and he had to carry it with him through that that time. But he was the only person who could have delivered competent government, record growth in the first half of 2024, and bringing inflation down to 2% would have been the foundation for an enduring recovery. But of course, by then our political lives had run out.

SS: You mentioned the sense that the change of government was on the horizon. What was your impression of the civil service during this time – did you feel like they were focused enough on serving the government of the day?

JG: Nominally. I think I had a particularly good team doing the infected blood because I had a focused piece of work to deliver. I found for some of the other work that was going on around civil service reform and numbers I just couldn’t grip them. I couldn’t get to grips with this vast machine that I was nominally in control of, and they were nominally deferential and perfectly polite. But again, I think as we got into the early months of 2024 they were just waiting for a change.

I feel very strongly that there should be more accountability for individual civil servants, beyond a certain level to be responsible for owning policy outcomes. You know, I look across Whitehall and I look at some areas where I just think, ‘well, how did this ever happen?’. I represent a very rural constituency – we had the abolition of the SFI [Sustainable Farming Incentive, a scheme paying farmers and land managers for adopting sustainable farming practices] overnight. Now, my party struggled to get the money out of the door, even when apparently £300 million would go back to the Treasury.

“I think as we got into the early months of 2024 [the civil service was] just waiting for a change.”

But how was it that a new government came in and the senior civil servants didn’t say ‘Look, we’ve got a demand-led scheme, the terms of which are much more attractive. Our concern would be capping it is necessary, otherwise you’re going to blow the budget’? Well, there’s either a lack of curiosity or understanding of the dynamics of that mechanism from the ministers. But there’s a lack of leadership from the senior civil servants and how they do that. And you’ve got to have a combination. 

Now, when I was economic secretary, I was dealing with a defined set of problems and an agenda where I was seeing those people week in, week out on the ground, and my civil servants were too. But, as Rishi said to me once, “we were spoilt in the Treasury, John.”

I don’t think the civil servants were actively hostile, but it’s a certain mindset. Having been at Accenture where I was earning £70,000 when I was 26 and every time it was more salary, more responsibility and promotion. There was a large number of people in the civil service who were just sort of stuck in mid-levels, just below deputy director, who were quite happy to stay there. There were too many of them. 

I mean, in one meeting, even on infected blood, there was a super lovely, capable, nice guy. I was having a meeting with several people from the APPG [all-party parliamentary group] and I said, “well, what’s the answer to this?” “Oh, no, that’s not my area, minister.” And I thought there’s no sense sometimes of passion and owning things. 

“There was a large number of people in the civil service who were just sort of stuck in mid-levels, just below deputy director, who were quite happy to stay there.”

And they were very rules-based. I had an example where we were going away on a trip somewhere and my spad found out he wanted to go to Singapore and he wanted to go the night before because the flight was cheaper. He offered to pay for the hotel even, but they wouldn’t, the rule said no. And there was this sort of slightly prissy rules-based approach with no pragmatism, really process-driven – it drives you mad. 

But in the end you have to work with it, because what other choice have you got? You either go down the alleged route of Dominic Raab [who resigned as justice secretary in 2023 after an investigation upheld some complaints that he had bullied civil servants], where you essentially find any contradiction in any way, in the words of your senior civil servants, and try and do it yourself – which is a triumph of self-belief over self-awareness, or even awareness of the complexity of delivering government. And you get into a situation where you then frustrate the systems because they feel you’re trying to go beyond them and you get accused of bullying. I suspect he was just frustrated that the delivery of what he wanted was so unreliable, slow and against timetables that weren’t of his design. And if you go into government to achieve things, to get things done, it’s deeply, deeply frustrating.

But what you’ve got to do is hold your nerve and not start going to the papers and briefing journalists, because in the end, the system is bigger than you are. And so I suppose I don’t have an enduring hostility, but I do feel frustration about the lack of professionalism. 

“there was this sort of slightly prissy rules-based approach with no pragmatism, really process-driven – it drives you mad.”

Michael Gove has many frustrating aspects, but one of his great qualities is he came in in 2010 and knew what he wanted to do. Now, by 2014, Lynton Crosby [then the Conservative Party’s campaign adviser] told David Cameron that he needed to move him to be chief whip because he was toxic with mothers in terms of what he’d achieved in Education and to this day, people don’t like him – but he’d achieved things. And to Dominic Cummings’s credit, they needed to have a clear agenda of how they were going to move the ‘blob’ through. And getting Nick Gibb [schools minister 2010–12, 2014–21 and 2022–23] in, who says ‘I’m going to do phonics and I’m going to stay there for a decade to deliver it’. It’s quite hard that you feel that unless you have that resolve, there are sort of self-righting authorities that push ministers who churn too much back to what they think is the orthodoxy.

And that’s why the critique and frustrations of more populist politicians is not without some merit. And it’s for the mainstream, if they wish to remain the mainstream, to acknowledge that and to do something about it.

SS: What was the role of your special adviser in this, helping you translate your political vision to a civil service which you could find frustrating at times?

JG: I don’t think I would say ‘political vision’, I think it’s a bit strong. You know, there’s a rhythm of activities you have to do as a minister and I think it’s making sure that you’ve covered all the bases, that you know the lines, that you are familiar with the trade-offs and you know where there are disputes over a spending decision. They talk to their network and the other spads to try and resolve what the landing zone is so that it’s less fraught between a cabinet minister and the chief secretary. And that was the principal role that they had. 

And also to give some reassurance on the political side when you’re interfacing, with lots of meetings all the time and lots of political discussions and lots of speeches and lots of media. You want somebody who’s going to tell you honestly how it comes over rather than somebody who doesn’t really care, just cares if you’ve got the messages on the sheet in an accurate form.

SS: Can you think of an example of when it was useful to have a spad?

JG: Well, I was lucky because I had one individual who I knew very well. I can’t really think of any specifics. I was very pleased to have him with me all the time and I think it sort of gave me confidence and insights into the handling of ministers. For example, I was dealing with Mel Stride when he was in DWP [the Department for Work and Pensions]. And I found Mel was… it was as if he’d been heavily briefed by DWP officials. So Mark tried to challenge the [DWP] spads on what Mel was trying to do. But of course again, when you got to the stage we were at in the cycle it was difficult to do what we really thought. Some of the changes to benefit entitlements and retirement age and so on were unconscionable, given where we were politically. So having a spad provided me with the backup to support the narrative that I was wanting to go down, and often had to smooth over things when things weren’t going in the right direction. 

SS: You spent the vast majority of your ministerial career in the centre of government. What do you think works well about it, and is there anything that you would change?

JG: Well, I’m very sympathetic to the Treasury. We need a strong department. There’s been some work done by Francis Maude about combining the chief secretary and the paymaster general together. Because essentially you need a spending control department that is savvy about what are the mechanisms to deliver on the budgets that have been given. You might give certain capital budgets, but the property function or the data function will tell you ‘well, you’re not going to be able to deliver that project in that time frame’ – so why have you given them that budget? It’s a notional budget just to satisfy them so they can say ‘we’ve got a 3% increase’, otherwise politically that minister is down. So I think there is a case to reformulate the spending control. But I would say it’s more that you should make the Treasury more powerful, not less powerful, because part of the problem is it’s nominally powerful, but it’s not well-informed.

I think there are two significant areas of change. We need ministers who are more capable of knowing what they’re doing and where they’re taking it, and articulating that. That gives confidence to the country. But they also need to be supported by civil servants who aren’t just patsies to that, but are actually enablers of it to happen. The danger is that the confident minister with a clear plan relies on strong communication skills and a compelling high-level narrative, but doesn’t grasp the detail of what that means in terms of the journey of change.

“We need ministers who are more capable of knowing what they’re doing and where they’re taking it, and articulating that.”

And I was watching Wes Streeting [health secretary, 2024–] being interviewed the other day and Camilla Tominey on GB News was challenging him on a single diversity role being advertised somewhere in Exeter, or something. As if it’s an abject failure of this government that he hasn’t gripped DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] because she’s found some ad in the Guardian’s job page or whatever. Well, I mean, what a silly and superficial way to conduct politics. But of course, what are they driven by? They’re driven by people going ‘oh, it’s outrageous!’, clicking on it and getting the advertising revenues, and that doesn’t edify at all. Do I support Wes’s ability to assert a more measured approach to that? Yes, I do. Should we have a leaner infrastructure for running the health service? Yes, we should.

But the challenge for a politician is how to blend effective government with the challenge of presenting it out there. And politics is always trying to trivialise – government is far more sophisticated than politicians can cope with and I think that was the problem that Rishi Sunak had. He was too sophisticated and good at government, but politics was more challenging and the politics changed around him, beyond his control.

“politics is always trying to trivialise – government is far more sophisticated than politicians can cope with and I think that was the problem that Rishi Sunak had.”

SS: You’re now on the Treasury select committee after spending a long time in the department. How has your time as a minister shaped the way you approach this?

JG: Well, it gives me a lot of insight. I’ve had people in front of the committee who I’ve appointed or worked with quite closely. It means I can be more forensic more easily. Shortly after this conversation I will go through a Teams call with all the members to allocate questions to the chancellor on Wednesday and the OBR [Office for Budget Responsibility] tomorrow and economists tomorrow afternoon.

And of course, you’ve seen the rhythms of fiscal events. I think six or eight fiscal events I’ve been involved in, either as a junior minister or as a PPS. And so, you know, it’s nice to be in familiar territory. But hopefully sometimes it’s helpful to offer perspectives and to encourage new colleagues who are eager to make a mark to reflect on some of the realities.

It isn’t an area, particularly economic secretary, where there are great dividing lines between the parties and that probably is a mode of politics that suits my personality quite well.

SS: What are you most proud of from your time in government and how would you describe your role in achieving that as a minister?

JG: Well, I think the infected blood compensation scheme, getting that done, has got to be up there. Because it was 40 years happening, and just a combination of circumstances that allowed me to be the one who had the opportunity to do. I think gripping that detail, handling the interface between experts, a very complicated stakeholder community and legislation – and an interface between the Treasury and No.10. So that tested me and I felt it was using my political skills as well as my communication skills, and I feel pleased to have got to significant staging post on the actual delivery of payments, although it’s a long way to go to get all the money out of the door.

“the infected blood compensation scheme, getting that done, has got to be up there.”

The second thing I would say is: look, usually economic secretaries move up quickly. They do it for one year. Emma Reynolds [appointed economic secretary to the Treasury in January 2025], I think she’s got to stay until late July 2029 to beat my record, which I think will be over the five years, so I think it’s going to be quite challenging, but she could technically. So I’m very pleased to have done that for longer than anyone else, not just for the time factor and to say that statement, but because I relished the familiarity and grip I could then have. It meant I could dig down into detailed conversations about the different views of the insurance industry and PRA officials over the assumptions behind the matching adjustment changes in Solvency II [the post-Brexit regulatory requirements for insurance firms]. Because I’d familiarised myself in some depth and therefore used my skills to be an interface between industry and regulators. 

In the last 18 months, I was probably doing that at a level that was pretty optimal – but rarely do we allow junior ministers to stay for too long. We do occasionally, but usually that sort of never-ending relentless desire for more power and status, when of course, if one really reflected and said ‘well, what is the summit of my likely trajectory?’, it probably isn’t going to be prime minister. So therefore, do this job well for long enough and you have the opportunity that I subsequently had as chief secretary.

“rarely do we allow junior ministers to stay for too long.” 

I’m 51 tomorrow and even if I have an extended season out of power, I look at characters like John Healey, Pat McFadden, Hilary Benn, Stephen Timms [ministers in the Starmer government who had previously served under the 1997–2010 Labour government] with quiet respect. And it will be my potential route to follow them back – I hope not after 14 years – into government. But also make a meaningful contribution in whatever way I can in the interim. I’ve enjoyed doing the St Antony’s fellowship [at the University of Oxford] with Liam Byrne this academic year, doing the Treasury select committee, and I’m also helping Anne Jenkin [Conservative peer] with Women2Win [a mentoring group to promote the election of more Conservative women MPs].

But I’m sure the next season, the next calendar year, will bring me more opportunities. It’s a great privilege to be a member of parliament, and you’re sitting below my constituency map – and I look at all those communities and I’m their MP, and that’s a great privilege. And I continue to do that with great affection and humility about it.

SS: What advice would you give to a new minister about how to be effective in office?

JG: Build strong relationships with your private office and with lead officials in the different policy areas. Be clear from the prime minister and from your secretary of state what you’re there to do. Be collegiate. 

Don’t think about the next job – think about doing this job well. Identify blocks and challenges early on and work out a way of handling them. Identify key stakeholders in parliament and outside and bring them into the conversations and the challenges that you’re having, rather than set up tense dynamics, which leads to dysfunctional conversations.

“Don’t think about the next job – think about doing this job well.” 

As Eric Pickles said to me, treat every day as a minister as if it’s your last. Because it’s a great privilege to be given the opportunity through our democracy to run part of government.

And realise that everything you say, that you write on WhatsApp, or almost that you think, there’ll be some FOI [freedom of information] mechanism that will bring it into the public domain. So be careful and cautious at all times and try and enjoy the privilege that it is to serve as a minister in His Majesty’s Government.

SS: Is there anything we haven’t covered that you’d like to mention?

JG: I wonder whether we should probably have spent a bit more time in the minutiae of the dynamics between civil servants and the structures, and so on. I mean, it’s difficult to really capture that, but I think what I would say is that during my time as economic secretary, people were doing 18 months, two years in a job. I was on the third or sometimes fourth cycle of officials for the ‘buy now, pay later’ regulatory team and I said “oh, you can’t do that – your predecessor-but-three, he said no!” [laughter]. And obviously at a senior level, people are in tenure for longer, but there is a certain dynamic.