Ex-Foreign Office mandarin Lord McDonald admits he openly told colleagues he voted Remain after finding fellow officials ‘in tears’ after the Brexit vote
Lord Simon McDonald, the former top civil servant at the Foreign Office, has admitted he told colleagues he voted Remain at the EU referendum.
The ex-mandarin defended the extraordinary breach of civil service impartiality rules as he described how fellow officials were ‘in tears’ after the Brexit vote in 2016.
The crossbench peer claimed he was ‘trying to maintain credibility’ among his colleagues by revealing his personal political views in the wake of the Leave result.
Lord McDonald served as the most senior official at the Foreign Office between 2015 and 2020 as the UK made its exit from the EU.
He had long been suspected of being an ardent Remainer but his confession that he publicly declared how he voted has stunned other Whitehall officials.
Lord Simon McDonald, the former top civil servant at the Foreign Office, has admitted he told colleagues he voted Remain at the EU referendum.
Lord McDonald served as the most senior official at the Foreign Office between 2015 and 2020, including a period when Boris Johnson was Foreign Secretary
The crossbench peer claimed he was ‘trying to maintain credibility’ among his Foreign Office colleagues by revealing his personal political views in the wake of the Leave result.
Lord McDonald: The Remainer mandarin
Lord McDonald of Salford, the ex-top official at the Foreign Office, was claimed to have been forced into early retirement from his civil service career in 2020.
Lord McDonald left his Foreign Office role at the time it was being merged with the Department for International Development by Boris Johnson.
According to reports prior to his departure, he was on a ‘s*** list’ of top civil servants that Number 10 wanted replaced following the PM’s 2019 general election landslide.
Widely regarded as an ardent Remainer, the mandarin’s departure swiftly came as part of the PM’s shake-up of Whitehall in the wake of the Covid crisis and after the UK’s official exit from the EU.
Mr Johnson and Lord McDonald were well-known to each other after the PM’s spell as Foreign Secretary in Theresa May’s Government – with the pair said to have ‘never seen eye to eye’ in their workings together.
Prior to his retirement from the Foreign Office, Lord McDonald had given confused evidence to MPs about Britain’s decision not to join an EU scheme to buy ventilators when the pandemic hit.
His exit from the civil service came despite him having previously expressed a wish to serve for an extra two years.
Last year, just prior to Mr Johnson being ousted as PM, Lord McDonald penned a bombshell letter to a parliamentary watchdog that deepened the Chris Pincher scandal.
He revealed Mr Johnson had previously been told of a 2019 complaint about Mr Pincher.
It gave further ammunition to Mr Johnson’s critics as he attempted to deal with fresh allegations against Mr Pincher’s behaviour.
Lord McDonald made the admission in a new BBC documentary titled Laura Kuenssberg: State of Chaos.
Speaking about his actions in the wake of the Brexit vote, he told the programme: ‘On this occasion, this solitary occasion, I decided to tell my colleagues – and therefore let ministers know – that I voted to Remain in the EU.
‘I felt they would assume that in any case, so I decided to embrace it.’
The civil service code of conduct includes strict guidance on Whitehall officials maintaining political impartiality.
It states that civil servants must not allow their ‘personal political views to determine any advice you give or your actions’ and should ‘serve the government, whatever its political persuasion, to the best of your ability in a way which maintains political impartiality’.
Pressed on why he ignored the principle of civil service impartiality after the Brexit vote, Lord McDonald added: ‘I was trying to maintain credibility and trying to convey a message to a group of people, most of whom I felt had voted to Remain in the EU, that their personal feelings were beside the professional point.
‘It was a personal decision. My board were not entirely comfortable and all these years later you can have a conversation about was it right, the right decision.’
Describing the atmosphere in the Foreign Office after the EU referendum result, Lord McDonald said: ‘The main feeling in the Foreign Office building was of mourning. People were in tears. People were in shock.’
Helen McNamara, a fellow former senior civil servant who served in Whitehall at the same time as Lord McDonald, expressed her surprise to the programme at her ex-colleague’s actions.
‘Wow… I don’t know why that would be a good or helpful thing,’ she said.
The documentary also heard from Lord Philip Hammond, who was Chancellor during Theresa May’s government.
Asked if the Treasury was trying to block Brexit during his time in charge, he replied: ‘The Treasury was certainly trying to go for a soft Brexit and I don’t think we should apologise for that at all.’
The documentary also explores suggestions that David Lidington, who was Mrs May’s de facto deputy, could have taken over as prime minister and called a second EU referendum amid the Westminster chaos over Brexit.
Asked if such conversations took place, Mr Lidington said: ‘Yes that was what happened. Theresa was not going to go that was very clear.
‘And I certainly never made any suggestion to her or made any move against her. I would not have done so.
‘There weren’t conspiracies, what there were were increasingly desperate searches for ways in which to break the deadlock with a deal.’
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