George Osborne

(asked on 20th March 2017) - View Source

Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will take steps to prevent the right hon. Member for Tatton from accessing copies of Government, Cabinet or Cabinet Committee papers relating to the period when he was in the Government while he is the Editor of the London Evening Standard.


Answered by
 Portrait
Ben Gummer
This question was answered on 24th March 2017

It is a longstanding convention that former Ministers are allowed reasonable access to the papers that were issued to them when in office. However, such access is at the Government's discretion and is conditional on potential authors undertaking to comply with the Radcliffe principles. The detail of the Radcliffe principles can be found in the Directory of Civil Service (volume 2), which is available on Gov.uk. I believe that the continued application of these provisions will provide the suitable reassurance that the Hon. Member is seeking.

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