Daily Archives: September 4, 2012

Kiran Stacey Tory changes to the cabinet

September 4, 2012 12:58 pm by Kiran Stacey

David Cameron has now completed the Conservative cabinet appointments of his first major reshuffle. As Nick Clegg works own reshuffle, here is the Tory side of the new cabinet (with the changes in bold):

PM: David Cameron
Chancellor: George Osborne
Home Secretary: Theresa May
Foreign Secretary: William Hague
Education Secretary: Michael Gove
Health Secretary: Jeremy Hunt
Justice Secretary: Chris Grayling
Welfare Secretary: Iain Duncan Smith
Defence Secretary: Philip Hammond
International Development Secretary: Justine Greening
Transport Secretary: Patrick McLoughlin
Communities Secretary: Eric Pickles
Environment Secretary: Owen Paterson
Culture Secretary: Maria Miller
Northern Ireland Secretary: Theresa Villiers
Welsh Secretary: David Jones  Read more

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Posted in Coalition, Conservatives, David Cameron |

Kiran Stacey Andrew Mitchell, the rubber stamp and the death penalty

September 4, 2012 10:41 am by Kiran Stacey
Andrew Mitchell

Andrew Mitchell, the new Tory chief whip

Lots of commentators are pointing out what a hard-line disciplinarian Andrew Mitchell is likely to make as the new Tory chief whip. Well I have two stories that add to that impression.

The first is Mitchell’s “bollocks” stamp, which, one civil servant tells me, he brandishes whenever he is given a document he doesn’t like. Mandarins more used to Labour’s more caring style when it came to international development were taken aback to find Mitchell regularly sending back briefing papers with that one word of feedback planted across it.

The other piece of Mitchell’s back story that people seem to forget is that he used to be a strong advocate of the death penalty. When I asked him about this in November last year, there was an extremely long pause before he said: Read more

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Posted in Conservatives, David Cameron, UK politics |