Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy forced to apologise after giving £130k job to Labour donor

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has been forced to apologise after a watchdog found she broke strict rules when she appointed a Labour Party donor to a £130,000 job regulating football. David Kogan will work three days a week as the new chairman of the Independent Football Regulator after he was appointed by Ms Nandy.

He made two donations totalling £2,900 to Ms Nandy in 2020, when she was standing for the Labour leadership. In the five years before his appointment, Mr Kogan donated a total of £33,410 donated to the Labour Party and to Labour candidates, either personally or through his company, David Kogan Ltd. He was also involved with a Labour-supporting website, LabourList. Sir William Shawcross, the Commissioner for Public Appointments, has now concluded that Ms Nandy broke the code governing appointments to government jobs.

The ruling does not stop Mr Kogan taking up the appointment, but the Tories said it showed Labour was guilty of handing key jobs to "cronies", and insisted a replacement candidate should now be found. However Mr Kogan made it clear he had no intention of standing down, saying: "My suitability for the role has never been in question, and at no point was I aware of any deviation from best practice."

In a letter to Sir Keir Starmer, the Culture Secretary has apologised for "unknowingly" breaking the rules by failing to declare that David Kogan had donated to her leadership campaign in the 2020 race to succeed Jeremy Corbyn.

The Prime Minister said in his reply that she had "acted in good faith", but reprimanded her by saying "the process followed was not entirely up to the standard expected".

As well as Ms Nandy's failure to disclose his donations, a potential conflict of interest was not discussed with Mr Kogan at interview, and his links to the Labour Party were not revealed, Sir William said in a report.

Sir William accepted she "unknowingly" breached the code, but said she should have checked whether she had received funds from him when she selected Mr Kogan as the Government's top candidate, given she had been told by then about his "extensive links" to the Labour Party.

Nigel Huddleston, Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, said: "The decision to appoint David Kogan, a major Labour Party donor and former director of LabourList, as chairman of the Independent Football Regulator, without disclosing his significant personal donations to Keir Starmer and Lisa Nandy, represents a serious breach of public trust.

"This goes to the heart of Keir Starmer's judgement. Both he and Lisa Nandy have very serious questions to answer about how such an appointment was ever allowed to proceed.

"This appointment bears all the hallmarks of Labour cronyism. We now know there have been three clear breaches of the process, leaving this appointment completely untenable. If Labour is serious about integrity and transparency, this appointment must be withdrawn immediately. Anything less would be a betrayal of the very standards Labour claim to uphold."

Alex Burghart, Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, who made the complaint to the Public Appointments Commissioner, said: "This is a wider pattern of corruption across this Labour Government, parachuting in political cronies into Whitehall. Their promises on ethics and integrity in Government have been repeatedly broken by continued breaches of the rules they pledged to uphold."

Ms Nandy told the Prime Minister: "The commissioner's conclusions include a finding that I unknowingly breached an aspect of the Governance Code on Public Appointments. I deeply regret this error. I appreciate the perception it could create, but it was not deliberate and I apologise for it."

She said she welcomed "the clear recognition that I did not know about two donations", and that as soon as she found out about them, she "chose to declare them and recuse myself" from the appointment process.

"I want to assure you that I took robust steps before the process began to check the Electoral Commission and Parliamentary register for any donations I had received since I became a Member of Parliament in 2010, and made proactive inquiries with former campaign staff. None of these clear steps identified the donations in question."

In a written response to Ms Nandy's apology, the Prime Minister said: "I note the commissioner's findings that the error was unknowing and I accept your assurance there was no intentional or deliberate action on your part to undermine the expectations set out in the Governance Code on Public Appointments.

"I know you to be a person of integrity and on the basis of your letter, it is clear you have acted in good faith."

He added: "Nonetheless, the process followed was not entirely up to the standard expected and I welcome your department's willingness to co-operate with the commissioner and the Cabinet Office to learn lessons, and to improve the guidance on handling conflicts of interests.

"I also recognise that the report in no way casts any doubt on the suitability of Mr Kogan for the important role of chair of the Independent Football Regulator."

IFR Chair David Kogan said: "I have cooperated fully throughout the investigation and can now draw a line under the process.

"As the Commissioner states, my suitability for the role has never been in question, and at no point was I aware of any deviation from best practice.

"It is now time to move on and get on with the business of setting up the IFR so we can tackle the critical and urgent issues facing football."

It comes a week after the Prime Minister cleared Rachel Reeves over her failure to obtain a rental licence for her south London family home.

It also follows on the heels of several high-profile exits from Government as a result of scandals.

Among these was Angela Rayner, the former deputy prime minister and housing secretary, who resigned following a row about her tax affairs.

Lord Mandelson was also sacked as ambassador to Washington after details of his relationship with the dead paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein came to light.