According to reporting today, Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary Of State for Culture, Media and Sport, lobbied the Prime Minister in support of Rupert Murdoch’s bid for BSkyB. The report says:
“The inquiry heard that the culture secretary drafted the email on his private Gmail account on 19 November 2010 despite being warned by his officials that he should not intervene because the decision was being taken exclusively by Cable. In the memo he voiced concern that Cable, the business secretary, had referred the takeover to media regulator Ofcom, warning him that James Murdoch was “pretty furious” and that the government “could end up in the wrong place in terms of media policy as a result”.
His Gmail account? Regardless of all else of Hunt’s manifest deficiencies, that act alone means that the man is not fit to hold Minsterial Office.
4 comments
Skip to comment form
There are two questions there:
1) why did he handle government related materials through an account not subject to logging as his ministerial account is? This alone suggests he was well aware he was doing something he shouldn’t
2) how did they get that Gmail data, or did he hand this over himself?
3) Bonus question: any other gov internal email forwarded to Gmail?
When I present to business executives about privacy and correct use of the Internet, I tend to put up a slide with a few clauses of the Google and Facebook Terms & Conditions – changed, so it doesn’t show from where they are. Generally, I get about an 80% agreement that these providers should not be used for private as well as business – which gerenates dismay when I then change slide and show them which name features instead of the dummy I inserted. It tends to bring the point down better than any of the traditional “preaching” – they have grown numb to that..
Maybe I ought to wander back into Cabinet Office..
Author
Peter
The answer to your bonus question is “lots”.
Maybe you should wander back. But nobody will listen. Trust me.
Mick
I suspect they have inherited so many houses of cards that cannot stand the clean wind of scrutiny that they certainly don’t want to bring someone in who actually fixes things quickly (like I did before when I got nudged – you know what I mean). A quick fix would amount to demonstrating they haven’t really paid for *talent* over the last few years..
Cynicism aside – have you ever seen an intelligent outsider get into a place where they could do the most good? Doesn’t even happen in commerce, let alone in government..
Speaking of that nudging episode – they too are at it again, and I predict the same ending..
Author
Peter
Cynic. I assume that you are talking about our old friends clueless and witless.
Sadly, as an ex HMG tech, I look back wistfully to the days when HMG actually bothered to employ technicians. You know, in the days before they decided that actual technicians were unnecessary, all they needed were “intelligent customers” in the procurement departments. Provision of efficient, effective systems and services could then be left to the marketplace.
We all know what happened then.