It has been revealed that the former Chancellor Philip Hammond is taking up a job with the government of Saudi Arabia.
On Monday, Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, the committee which oversees business appointments for former ministers (ACOBA), revealed in a set of documents that Mr Hammond is taking up a job with the government of Saudi Arabia.
According to the documents uncovered, the former Chancellor will be a paid as a part-time advisor to the Kingdom’s Finance Minister as the country prepares to host the G20 Leaders’ summit in November.
Mr Hammond is reported to have told the committee that the role would mean ‘engaging’ with G20 countries, including the UK, on behalf of the Kingdom.
The former Chancellor has previously come under fire for accepting a watch worth nearly £2,000 from a Saudi businessman, despite a ban on ministers accepting expensive gifts.
In July of last year, Hammond visited the country as Chancellor, to promote economic and social reform. On the trip, paid for by the taxpayer, he met the Minister of Finance who would later offer him a job.
The committee has asked that Hammond not be ‘personally involved’ in lobbying the government, though that ‘would not prevent’ him from having contact with the UK government on behalf of the Saudis. The Cabinet Office is also reported as hoping that Hammond, as a former HM’s Government minister, will ‘act in the UK’s national interest’.
I couldn’t have put it better than Steerpike of the Spectator who wrote about the irony of the whole ordeal: “It appears that the former Chancellor, who in September said the Tory party is no longer ‘tolerant’ and has been infected with ‘ideological puritanism that brooks no dissent’ has no problem working with a regime that regularly persecutes government critics, tortures and beheads the accused, and is suspected of brutally killing the journalist and critic of the regime Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.”
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Editor-in-Chief | Carl D. Pearson has been involved in British politics and media from an early age, with the key knowledge of what it takes to run a news organisation for the 21st century. Mr Pearson, as Editor-in-chief, is responsible for supervising the daily tasks of publishing media and content to UNN’s website and various platforms.
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