Allegations of chumocracy were circulating once again today after it was revealed Carrie Symonds’s best friend had been handed a lucrative contract with the government without the role being advertised.
According to reports in The Critic Nimco Ali was made an adviser on tackling violence against women and girls in October.
She is paid £350 a day for around two days’ work a month for a role that was not advertised through any competitive application process, a freedom of information request revealed.
The Home Office insisted the procedure was “appropriate for short-term advisory roles”, but it will once again raise eyebrows over cronyism within the government.
This week it emerged that a friend and former neighbour of Matt Hancock was able to supply tens of millions of vials for NHS Covid-19 tests – despite having no previous experience of making medical supplies.
Alex Bourne, who used to run a pub near to the health secretary’s former home in his Suffolk constituency, said he offered his services several months ago – by sending Hancock a personal WhatsApp message.
And he isn’t alone.
In October it was revealed a seven week-old firm with links to a Conservative peer landed a £122 million PPE contract despite having no obvious qualification beyond links to very substantial donors to, you guessed it, the Conservative Party.
A small, loss-making firm run by a Conservative councillor was also revealed to have been handed a £156 million contract to import PPE without any competition in the same month, a deal that one person said “reeks of cronyism”.
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