Tory minister pocketed £8,000 pay-off then returned to job seven weeks later

A Tory Health Minister pocketed nearly £8,000 in severance pay, solely to return to the identical division simply seven weeks later.

Maria Caulfield obtained £7,920 when she was faraway from her Government job when Liz Truss grew to become PM in September 2022. The former nurse was re-appointed as a Health Minister when Rishi Sunak entered No10 the subsequent month, however she nonetheless clung onto her pay-off.

Farcically this implies she acquired paid greater than if she hadn’t had seven weeks as a backbencher.

The Liberal Democrats have demanded the Lewes MP hand again the money, which was made public within the Department for Health and Social Care’s annual report and was first reported by the HSJ.

Lib Dem Chief Whip Wendy Chamberlain mentioned: “This is a slap within the face for taxpayers who’ve needed to decide up the tab for an countless revolving door of Conservative ministers. It could also be throughout the guidelines however it’s not throughout the spirit of them. Maria Caulfield ought to do the first rate factor and hand this a reimbursement. It simply reveals that severance fee guidelines should not match for objective and are in want of pressing reform.”

The Tories earlier this month blocked a clampdown on severance payments, that would have seen ministers have their money stopped if they returned to government. Almost £1million was paid out to departing ministers during the chaotic end to Boris Johnson’s premiership and then the arrivals of Ms Truss and Mr Sunak in No10.

Outgoing ministers under 65 are entitled to severance payments equivalent to one quarter of their annual salary. Those reappointed as a minister within three weeks are not eligible. They receive the cash regardless of how long they served in a government post or the circumstances in which they left.

Labour used an Opposition Day Debate to try to reform the system, but they were stopped by 275 votes to 192. The party proposed that outgoing ministers would only be able to claim a quarter of their actual earnings over the previous 12 months. This would have drastically reduced the bill for Tory MPs who served just weeks in Ms Truss’s government from claiming three months in severance. Individuals returned as a ministers would have had their payments slashed and those brought down by scandal would have received nothing at all.