Former Treasury boss and Brexit negotiator 'lined up for Labour job'

2023-01-23

Former Treasury boss Tom Scholar and ex-Brexit negotiator Olly Robbins ‘lined up for senior Labour job’ as Keir Starmer aims to add Government experience to the top of the party ahead of the next election

The two men were linked with the opposition leader’s vacant chief of staff post
After 12 years in opposition Sir Keir’s team lacks experience of Government
Sir Tom, 54, and Sir Olly, 47, both worked in No10 during New Labour years

Two former senior civil servants have been linked with a senior Labour job as Sir Keir Starmer organises his top team for a potential election win.

Sir Tom Scholar, the ex-permanent secretary at the Treasury, and Sir Olly Robbins, a senior Brexit negotiator for Theresa May, have been linked with the opposition leader’s vacant chief of staff post.

After 12 years in opposition Sir Keir’s team is lacking in previous experience of Government, with less than two years to go until the next election and a large Labour poll lead.

Sir Tom, 54, and Sir Olly, 47, both held the No10 post of principal private secretary under New Labour before moving on to other senior Civil Service jobs. Sir Olly went on to work for Tory PM Theresa May.

After 12 years in opposition Sir Keir’s team is lacking in previous experience of Government, with less than two years to go until the next election and a large Labour poll lead.

The chief of staff post has been vacant since October, when Sam White left after reports of tensions within the operation.

Sir Keir said his exit was due to the changes to the scale of the leader of the opposition’s operation.

‘Sam has played an incredible role taking our operation to the next level. Under his leadership the team has become better and stronger,’ he said.

But ‘with the merger, running the leader’s office becomes a smaller role than Sam signed up for and we both agree, as we’re making this change, now is the right time to go’.

Sir Tom was removed from his Treasury post by short-lived chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng in one of his first acts on taking office in September.

Autumn PM Liz Truss had previously railed against ‘Treasury orthodoxy’ and the decision to get rid of the mandarin on the first day of her new Government, was seen as a signal of her determination to change the direction of economic policy.

Ms Truss is said to have personally pushed for the sacking of a former aide to Gordon Brown.

Sources close to the former Treasury chief told the Times he was unlikely to take the post as he had ‘never been very political’.

Sir Olly resigned as Britain’s chief Brexit negotiator ahead of Boris Johnson taking power in 2019.

He left for a City post with Goldman Sachs as the incoming PM introduced a completely different approach to Brexit from his predecessor.

As the man who secured Theresa May’s doomed Brexit deal on the ground in Brussels, Mr Robbins was seen as a bogeyman figure by many of Mr Johnson’s supporters and, as far as they were concerned, his position was untenable.

Brexiteers blamed Mrs May’s personal EU adviser and head of the Cabinet Office’s powerful Europe Unit for softening the terms of Britain’s exit and failing to demand concessions on the hated Northern Irish ‘backstop’.

They have also pointed to Sir Olly’s support for a federal European system while studying at Oxford, accusing him of secretly plotting to keep Britain tied to Brussels indefinitely.

But one colleague defended him, saying: ‘Whatever faults people have found with Olly, he was always deeply loyal to Theresa and did everything she asked of him in the negotiations. Any sins he has been accused of were largely hers, but her party found it easier to blame him until recently.’

Dubbed ‘the mandarin’s mandarin’ he worked in senior positions under every Prime Minister since Tony Blair, including as Gordon Brown’s private secretary and as National Security Adviser to David Cameron.

But as Sir Keir tries to balance the Brexit position of his party, a Labour source told the Times he could be seen as ‘too Remainy’.

It is understood that while some Labour figures have floated them as candidates, neither is on the party’s radar.

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