Press briefing from the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman on: Ruth Kelly, ID cards and Iran
Ruth Kelly
Asked if it was correct that there would be no reshuffle till after Ruth Kelly’s statement, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) said that he did not give a running commentary on reshuffles. But as it was they could see it was already a busy week.
Asked what communications Ruth Kelly had with the Prime Minister in recent days, the PMOS said that as always he would not go into detailing conversations. It was however, only natural on a subject of such public concern that the department and No10 were in regular contact. Asked if the Prime Minister was still satisfied that Ruth Kelly was the right person for the job, the PMOS said the position remained unchanged on what he had said last week. Put to the PMOS that Ruth Kelly was being diverted from concentrating on the white paper, the PMOS said that part of the Education Secretary’s job was to deal with matters like this and reassure the public in the best possible way that the Government was taking all the action that it could to make sure that the issue was dealt with properly. Therefore it was not a distraction; it was part of the job.
The white paper was also an important part of the job and she would get on with that as well. It was however right and proper that the Secretary of State for Education took the time to deal with this matter and come back to Parliament with a comprehensive report, which she would do on Thursday. Asked in that case if this was normal business, the PMOS said no. It was however part of, for any department, the Secretary of States job to reassure the public when issues of concern arose. Therefore this was what Ruth Kelly was doing in a calm and methodical way.
Asked about the Guardian splash’s serious allegation about further chaos in the system, the PMOS said that the Guardian had asserted that it was a leaked document. We held up our hands up! We had leaked it. The document was sent to stakeholders as part of the process of taking forward the Bichard proposals. These were all measures, which we addressed in Bichard. So it was in fact not a leaked document. It did not reveal anything that had not been addressed. Therefore, frankly, the Guardian article had something of a credibility problem.
Put to him that the point was that it had not been addressed, the PMOS said it had been addressed and a commitment had been given to introduce legislation in the Queen’s Speech. We had now given a commitment that we would bring forward that legislation to implement Bichard by the end of February. Asked when the letter to stakeholders had been sent, the PMOS said that it had been part of the process of bringing forward legislation but directed the journalist to the department for the precise detail.
Asked when the bill was coming and when it would be put to a vote, the PMOS said the bill would be published, contrary to what the Daily Telegraph had asserted, in February and there was an expectation that it would go to a vote sometime early to mid March as was planned all along.
Asked whether the department was aware of any case where somebody had re-offended now that it had been working on the review for a week, the PMOS said he would not give a running commentary on the review’s progress. It was best to wait till the Secretary of State reported on it to parliament. The reason why she had taken time to carry out the review was because this was a process that had grown on a piecemeal basis and therefore what you needed to do was have a comprehensive review of that process as a whole. That took time, even if it meant taking the heat for a short period, but it was best to get it right. Asked if the review was still looking back over several decades, the PMOS said that where there were areas of concern it would look at those.
The Secretary of State would explain all that the review had done on Thursday. Asked if Ruth Kelly was still meeting regularly with backbench MPs on the white paper as she had been prior to the sex offenders’ issue, the PMOS said that it was inevitable that whenever you were faced with an issue like this that you focused on it. We would come back to the white paper whenever it was appropriate to do so. First and foremost the public expected any Secretary of State, of any colour, to focus attention on an issue such as this as was right and proper.
Asked to explain the logic of removing Ministers from the decision making process when officials had got it wrong before, the PMOS said that we accepted that it was a legitimate question to ask who was the right person to make this decision. He would not pre-empt the review but he was happy to acknowledge it was a legitimate question.
ID cards
Put to the PMOS that the KPMG report on ID cards had recommended a more detailed risk based cost analysis, the PMOS said that the project had already been through a number of processes. It had already been through a further Office of Government Commerce (OGC) review on business justification. The review confirmed that the project was ready to proceed to the next phase. An independent assurance panel was now in place to ensure that the work was subject to rigorous on-going challenge by experts as well as major periodic reviews via the OGC process.
In addition there had been the KPMG independent review. So in terms of oversight and reviews it had certainly been scrutinised. It was also subject to the normal audit procedures of departmental expenditure through the National Audit Office (NAO). What would not be wise, however, would be to reveal what our baseline was in discussions with commercial contractors because that would take away the commercial flexibility needed to get the best value for money. In any other realm of business you would not expect an organisation to reveal what it’s baseline cost was precisely for that reason.
Iran
Asked if the British Government was open to President Putin’s compromise idea on Iran, the PMOS said that we had said all along that our ideal out for this was a diplomatic solution. But a diplomatic solution had to mean than Iran abided by its international obligations. Therefore that was the test. If Iran wanted to come up with a solution that met that test, fine. Mr El Baradei was even stronger on this in his Newsweek interview. He had said, "I do not want the agency to be cheated; I do not want the process to be abused." That was they key test.
Would it meet his standard and meet the international communities standard. Put to the PMOS that Mr El Baradei had not been speaking about Iran specifically, the PMOS said that Mr El Baradei had addressed the question of Iran in recent days. Asked if there was any indication of increased willingness for UNSC referral from Russia and China, the PMOS said that China and Russia would speak for themselves and it was not for him to talk for them. However, the fact that the IAEA Board meeting had been brought forward by about a month spoke for itself. That showed that everyone accepted that there was now a new urgency to deal with this issue, which was a good thing. Asked if in reality much could be done, the PMOS said that the reality was that we had to persuade Iran to abide by its international obligations.
People only had to look at the Iranian President’s remarks on Israel to understand why we had to persuade them to abide by those international obligations. Put to him that they were not going to be persuaded, the PMOS said that thankfully fatalism did not characterise our approach to international affairs.
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