Starmer Defends Naming Ex-Banks Lobbyist to City Job

(Bloomberg) -- Keir Starmer’s office said the prime minister was still committed to ending revolving-door relationships between government and business after appointing a former financial industry lobbyist to oversee the very firms she represented as recently as last year.

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The prime minister’s spokesman David Pares said on Wednesday that Emma Reynolds would bring a “wealth of experience” to the role of economic secretary to the Treasury, commonly known as City minister. Reynolds had previously served as managing director of public affairs at TheCityUK, a trade group representing British banks, until shortly before her election as a Labour member of Parliament in July.

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Reynolds was appointed to the role on Tuesday, after the resignation of Tulip Siddiq over an ethics review of her links to the deposed Bangladeshi regime. Pressure had built on Siddiq to step aside in part because the City minister’s portfolio includes anti-corruption efforts, responsibilities that now fall to Reynolds.

In a speech last January, Starmer promised to put an end to the “revolving doors between government and the companies they regulate.” Pares said the premier’s position hadn’t changed and that the appointment didn’t constitute an example of a “revolving door.”

The appointment puts an ally of the British banking industry on a key Treasury perch, just as the Labour Party presses for regulators to place a greater emphasis on growth. Bloomberg News reported last month that Reynolds, 47, had lobbied the previous Conservative administration for the financial sector to water down proposed restrictions on Chinese business activity.

Reynolds then urged ministers not to include China in the strictest risk category — or “enhanced tier” — of new national security legislation that would require greater transparency in business declarations, Bloomberg previously reported. TheCityUK had argued the onerous disclosure rules would impede investment and generate negative publicity.

At the time, a Labour party official said she Reynolds wasn’t involved in the government’s China policy as pensions minister, a distinction that might be more difficult to maintain in her new role. Siddiq worked on matters related to China and had been due to visit the country with Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves last week before the ethics review overtook events.

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“It has been determined there’s no need for any recusal or changes to her portfolio,” Pares told a separate news briefing on Thursday. “Any relevant interests have been duly declared and managed appropriately.”

--With assistance from Joe Mayes.

(Adds comments from prime minister’s spokesman in eighth paragraph.)

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