Birmingham: DCLG tried to stop Clarke appointment

The Department for Communities and Local Government put in a written objection to Michael Gove’s plan to pull in a former head of police counter terrorism operations to oversee an investigation into schools in Birmingham.

I’m told other departments might well have waded in with objections too but the time given to object was so short only the DCLG, with responsibility for community relations, managed to get in under the wire.

But to no effect. The PM sided with Michael Gove and the announcement of Peter Clarke’s appointment was made today. The list of critics of this decision now spans the local W Midlands police chief, the council and who knows how many in Whitehall.

Update:

I am told that the Secretary of State at DCLG, Eric Pickles, did not personally object to the appointment of Peter Clarke to head the investigation into certain Birmingham schools.

A letter did go out from DCLG warning against the appointment but it came from “officials who didn’t know the thinking of ministers,” according to a Whitehall source.

A subsequent letter then went out from Eric Pickles’ private secretary which conveyed the secretary of state’s view that his preference was for the appointment to be made on an advisory basis but he did not object.

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