Home Office is FINED by the Treasury after May and Rudd broke rules with big pay packages for child sex abuse inquiry chief and panel

By James Tapsfield
Daily Mail
July 14, 2017

https://goo.gl/wHL8ff

Theresa May (pictured right at the Spectator summer party last night) and Amber Rudd (pictured left launching the government's drugs strategy yesterday) both breached Treasury rules on setting pay

Professor Alexis Jay took over from Dame Lowell in August 2016. Her remuneration was set without following rules about getting clearance from the Treasury

Mrs May drafted in Dame Lowell Goddard (pictured in Novermber 2015) to head the troubled inquiry in February 2015 - but she resigned 18 months later after a disastrous tenure

The pay and benefits packages were not authorised by Treasury, as demanded by government rules. The initial breach on pay for the panel happened when George Osborne (pictured) was Chancellor

Theresa May and Amber Rudd both broke government rules by handing big pay packages to senior figures on the child sex abuse inquiry.

The Home Office has been fined more than £366,000 by the Treasury after the chair and panel for the probe were handed six-figure packages without authorisation.

Theresa May set up the inquiry in 2014 in response to allegations of child sex abuse at institutions ranging from the BBC to children's homes, but it has been beset by trouble from the start.

Mrs May was responsible for breaking the rules when as Home Secretary she set the daily rates for panel members at a generous £565 a day.

And Mrs Rudd breached them again in August last year when she appointed Professor Alexis Jay as chair on a £220,000 package.

Under austerity restrictions introduced by the coalition, any remuneration at a level of £142,500 or higher has to be signed off by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury.

As a result the Treasury imposed an 'exemplary' fine of more than £366,000 to make clear its displeasure.

The fine also relates to the pay of the inquiry's three panel members - one of whom, Drusilla Sharpling, received a basic salary of £152,424 in 2015-6. 

After two abortive attempts to appoint chairs, Mrs May drafted in Dame Lowell Goddard in February 2015 - but the New Zealand judge resigned 18 months later after a disastrous tenure and contested allegations of inappropriate behaviour.

The scale of Dame Lowell's pay and benefits had caused fury, and she was reportedly given an £80,000 pay-off when she quit last August.

The Home Office's latest accounts suggested that the fine related to Mrs May's failure to follow rules when she appointed the judge to the key post.

However, the department later clarified the document and said the breaches related to the pay of the panel and Prof Jay.

The accounts state: 'The Home Office paid an exemplary fine of £366,900 after securing retrospective approval from the Chief Secretary of the Treasury in relation to breaching the control process in negotiating the salaries of the Chair of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) as well as each of the four panel members of the IICSA, in financial year 2015-16.'

A Government spokesman said: 'The Treasury has the power to consider fines for departments who breach agreed spending control processes, including those relating to senior salary approval.

'The Home Office paid an exemplary fine of £366,900 after securing retrospective approval from he Treasury in relation to breaching the control process in negotiating the salaries of the Chair of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse as well as each of the four panel members.

'This fine relates to the appointment of Professor Alexis Jay as IICSA Chair in August 2016 and the panel members' salary pay that was agreed by the Home Office for 2015/16.

'The Home Office have since reviewed appointment procedures to prevent further such breaches.' 

Former shadow chancellor Chris Leslie told MailOnline the pay packages were a 'debacle' and 'flew in the face of the most basic checks of the Treasury's rules'.

'We need an explanation from the Prime Minister about why this was allowed to happen,' he added. 

Dame Lowell was awarded a salary by the Home Office of £360,000, plus a generous expenses package. 

That gave her a further £110,000 annual rental allowance, £12,000 for utility bills, and a car and driver for official business.

She was also entitled to four business-class return flights to New Zealand for her and her husband, plus two return economy flights for her children — with annual costs estimated at £55,000. 

Dame Lowell was the third inquiry head to quit.

Amber Rudd told the Home Affairs Select Committee at the time that she believed Dame Lowell left because the New Zealand judge 'found it too lonely; she was a long way from home'.

But there were allegations that she had made racist comments and been rude to junior staff.

The judge dismissed the claims as 'false' and 'malicious' and said she had faced; 'widening personal attacks on me and my competence'.