Sue Gray Report

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 31st January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

Certainly, the Prime Minister makes clear in his Statement, and says explicitly, that he is sorry for things that have been got wrong and for the way that things have bene handled and he understands people’s anger. That is why he has accepted in full the initial findings of this Gray report and wants to get on straight away with implementing changes to address them.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness has attempted to answer the question from the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, to the best of her ability, I have no doubt. But would she agree that, when the report refers to “failures of leadership”, it is not clear from what the Prime Minister said in his Statement that he understands or accepts that his own leadership is included among those failures? It would be helpful if the noble Baroness could assure the House—again, to the best of her ability—that he does understand that. If he does, what implications follow from that? I think that is really the question that we are not yet able to answer.

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

The Prime Minister has said that he takes full responsibility; he has repeatedly apologised and, as this Statement shows, is committed to making changes to address these issues. Hence, as I mentioned, he is going to look at changes to the way that No. 10 and the Cabinet Office are run, creating an office of the Prime Minister with a permanent secretary and a review of various codes, as discussed. He has said that he will say more in the coming days about the steps being taken to improve the No. 10 operation and the work of the Cabinet Office, to strengthen Cabinet government and to improve the connection between No. 10 and Parliament. He has certainly said that he takes these matters extremely seriously.