A Downing Street molehunt is under way today after the leaking of private texts in which Boris Johnson promised Sir James Dyson he would ‘fix’ a tax rule so the tycoon’s staff could help make ventilators for the NHS.
Mr Johnson mounted a furious defence of his efforts to ramp up the pandemic response as he was berated by Keir Starmer over ‘sleaze’ at PMQs, saying he made ‘no apology’ for pulling out all the stops at the height of the crisis.
The premier said he had been moving ‘heaven and earth’ to get as many ventilators as possible amid dire warnings the health service would be overwhelmed with patients who needed them.
Mr Johnson also suggested he is willing to release his full private communications with the billionaire inventor, who had volunteered to help at no profit
The angry clashes came as MPs raised the alarm about civil service sabotage.
One former ministers pointed out Mr Johnson would have been obliged to disclose the messages to officials, and highlighted the slew of recent leaks over alleged cronyism and the Greensill lobbying row.
Another MP told MailOnline: ‘There is a horrible leaker in the Cabinet Office or No10.’
A Government source insisted the PM had ‘complied with the ministerial code’ – which states that if discussion are held without officials present ‘any significant content should be passed back to the department as soon as possible’.
But they insisted the origin of the leaks might not be straightforward. ‘It could be several places not just the obvious one,’ the source said.
Treasury sources dismissed suggestions Mr Sunak was concerned about the text exchange, and denied the leak had come from his allies.
Sir James wrote an official letter to the Treasury asking for the tax status of his staff to remain the same if they moved from Singapore to the UK to produce vital ventilators during the pandemic.
But in a private text seen by the BBC, Mr Johnson told Sir James that he ‘will fix it’ himself.
He then added ‘Rishi says it is fixed!! We need you here’.
Just two weeks later, Rishi Sunak told MPs that those coming into the UK to offer help during the pandemic would not see a change in their tax status.
It is the latest in a string of cronyism and lobbying questions facing the Conservative Party, after accusations that David Cameron used his influence and contacts to lobby ministers and officials behalf of his financier boss Lex Greensill.
This included texting Mr Sunak in an unsuccessful effort to secure coronavirus loans.
Last month WhatsApp messages between Matt Hancock and a former neighbour who supplied the NHS with test tubes emerged, sparking questions over how they had come into the public domain.
Boris Johnson mounted a furious defence of his efforts to ramp up the pandemic response as he was berated by Keir Starmer at PMQs
Boris Johnson (right) promised Sir James Dyson (left) that tycoon’s staff would not have to pay additional tax if they came to the UK to make ventilators for the NHS, reports claim
Two weeks after the text exchange, Chancellor Rishi Sunak told MPs that those coming into the UK to offer help during the pandemic would not see a change in their tax status
The former-PM denies breaking any rules, but conceded he should have made approaches to ministers using more ‘formal’ channels.
The Treasury Committee has launched an inquiry into the government’s dealings with failed finance firm Greensill Capital – with Mr Cameron, Mr Greensill and Mr Sunak all set to be grilled by MPs in person.
Dyson played a key role during the pandemic, working with scientists and a Cambridge-based Technology Partnership to produce 10,000 ventilators for hospitals across the country.
In messages between the PM and Sir James, the former writes: ‘We are ready. But nobody seems to want us to proceed. Sadly, James.’
Mr Johnson replied saying he will ‘fix it tomorrow’ adding: ‘We need you. It looks fantastic.’
Sir James replied saying: ‘Thanks! I will give the ventilator our all.’
He then adds: ‘Dear Boris, I’m afraid that we need a response to our letter below from Rishi please?
‘We really need Rishi to answer the letter we sent (attached) – now. Or to make the position clear.
‘Rishi has fixed the Country Day Count issue but not Work Days.
‘The former is now covered under an ”Exceptional Circumstances” umbrella, Work Days are not.
‘So, he has freed up your ability to be in the UK but not to work there – even in support of this National emergency.’
Mr Johnson reassured him, writing: ‘James I am first lord of the treasury and you can take it that we are backing you to do what you need.’
Sir James said: ‘When the Prime Minister rang me to ask Dyson to urgently build ventilators, of course I said yes. We were in the midst of an national emergency and I am hugely proud of Dyson’s response – I would do the same again if asked.
‘Our ventilator cost Dyson £20million, freely given to the national cause, and it is absurd to suggest that the urgent correspondence was anything other than seeking compliance with rules, as 450 Dyson people – in UK and Singapore – worked around the clock, seven days a week to build potentially life-saving equipment at a time of dire need.
‘Mercifully they were not required as medical understanding of the virus evolved.
‘Neither Weybourne nor Dyson received any benefit from the project, indeed commercial projects were delayed, and Dyson voluntarily covered the £20m of development costs.
‘Not one penny was claimed from any Government, in any jurisdiction, in relation to Covid-19.’
In bruising clashes in the Commons, Sir Keir suggested it was ‘one rule for those that have got the Prime Minister’s phone number, another for everybody else’.
‘What does the Prime Minister think is the right thing to do if he receives a text message from a billionaire Conservative supporter asking him to fix tax rules?’
Mr Johnson responded: ‘If he’s referring to the request from James Dyson, I make absolutely no apology at all for shifting heaven and earth and doing everything I possibly could, as I think any prime minister would in those circumstances, to secure ventilators for the people of this country.
‘And to save lives and to roll out a ventilator procurement which the Labour-controlled Public Accounts Committee themselves said was a benchmark for procurement.’
After Sir Keir jibed that it was ‘sleaze, sleaze, sleaze… and all on your watch’, a clearly infuriated Mr Johnson retorted that he was ‘proud’ of the government’s efforts on ventilators. ‘I am proud of the decisions we took,’ he said.
He renewed his attack on ‘Captain Hindsight’ Sir Keir, insisting the Labour leader had appeared at the time to be in favour of securing more ventilators.
In a blow to Sir Keir’s stance, former PM Tony Blair also expressed sympathy for Mr Johnson and Sir James, saying he found it hard to get ‘worked up’ about the issue.
He said: ‘We were in the middle of a pandemic. And after all, we were actually asking James Dyson to step forward and start making ventilators.
‘I find it hard to get worked up about this, and I also don’t know the details…’
Mr Blair went on: ‘I think there’s got to be a certain degree of understanding if you’re in the middle of a huge crisis like this.’
Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said that Sir James had been been seeking assurances from the Prime Minister his people would not be ‘disadvantaged’ in coming to the UK to help with the ventilator drive.
He told BBC Breakfast on Wednesday: ‘I believe what happened in this case was that Dyson was seeking an assurance that people from his company that came to the UK to help were not disadvantaged.’
When asked if the Prime Minister’s text messages should be covered by transparency rules Mr Dowden said: ‘We have robust transparency rules.
‘The point here is this was not normal times, this was not business as usual as a Government in peace time.
‘We were essentially at war with this virus, people expected us to move very rapidly, the Prime Minister moved rapidly, and the result of this was that it helped us to meet this ventilator challenge.
‘It has to be viewed in this context.’
It is the latest in a string of lobbying questions facing the Conservative Party, sparked by accusations that David Cameron (pictured) used his influence and contacts to lobby ministers and officials behalf of his financier boss Lex Greensill
The Treasury Committee has launched an inquiry into the government’s dealings with failed finance firm Greensill Capital – with Mr Cameron , Mr Greensill (pictured) and Mr Sunak all set to be grilled by MPs in person
Under the ministerial code – a list of rules laying out the conduct expected by ministers – ‘a private secretary or official should be present for all discussions relating to government business’.
Should a conversation happen without an official, ‘any significant content should be passed back to the department as soon as possible after the event’.
It also states that ministers should ‘act and take decisions in an open and transparent manner’ and ‘must act and take decisions impartially, fairly and on merit, using the best evidence and without discrimination or bias’.
Shadow business minister Lucy Powell said the text messages were ‘jaw-dropping’.
She told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘It stinks, really, that a billionaire businessman can text the Prime Minister and get an immediate response and apparently an immediate change in policy.
‘It seems like the country only works for people who are rich enough or influential enough and, frankly, donors to the Tory Party, who have the personal mobile number of the Prime Minister and Chancellor.’
When it was pointed out that the texts had been exchanged during a ‘desperate situation’ at the start of the pandemic, Ms Powell said: ‘It’s about fairness of access here.
‘Government needs to work for everyone, not just for the privileged few and those who happen to have the phone number of the Prime Minister and who happen to sit next to him at some Tory glamour ball.’