Companies benefiting from inside influence
Dec
6
Written by:
06/12/2011 15:16
Corporate staff seconded to government departments
The Guardian today reported that a number of large energy companies have been providing free staff to the Conservative government to help write energy policy.
Around 50 employees from the likes of EDF Energy, npower and Centrica have been on secondments of up to two years raising serious concerns about industry access to the highest levels of government.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs took in 13 staff from the energy sector including three from EDF Energy, npower and Shell. The paper also revealed that the Treasury had taken on 209 secondments since January 2007.
Green party MP Caroline Lucas, who helped obtain the information via freedom of information requests, told the Guardian: "Companies such as the big six energy firms do not lend their staff to government for nothing – they expect a certain degree of influence, insider knowledge and preferential treatment in return..."
Civil servants have also moved the other way, with secondments to Shell and Horizon Nuclear Power, a joint venture of E.ON and RWE npower (a company that wants to build nuclear power stations in the UK).
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