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Beckett shrugs off call to quit over farm Single Payments disaster
FOREIGN Secretary Margaret Beckett last night shook off the findings of a damning report which blamed her for the farm payments catastrophe and called for her resignation.
There was a similar reaction from the top Whitehall mandarin who was also savaged over the botched handling of the Single Payments Scheme – suggesting that no one else would lose their jobs in the furore.
A 12-month-long Commons inquiry concluded yesterday that former Environment Secretary Mr Beckett and key senior civil servants had chosen the "complex and very high- risk" system of calculating payments that lay at the heart of the breakdown at the Rural Payments Agency (RPA).
The findings of the Labour-dominated committee – reported in yesterday's Yorkshire Post – said it was unacceptable that Mrs Beckett and some of her former officials had "moved on unscathed or stayed in post" when they should have resigned or been sacked.
Delays in processing subsidy applications led to misery for tens of thousands of farmers and landed them, and the taxpayer, with a bill approaching 500m.
But Mrs Beckett's spokesman last night indicated she was too busy with the Iran situation to address the concerns of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee, and appeared again to shift responsibility back to the civil service.
He said: "As Secretary of State at the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, she took decisions in good faith on the Single Farm Payment based on the information and expert advice given to her at the time."
But the civil service would not accept the criticism of her former permanent secretary at Defra, Sir Brian Bender, now top official at the Department for Trade and Industry.
MPs said they remained "astonished" he was still in his job, adding: "If he does not tender his resignation the head of the Home Civil Service should explain why a failure such as this results in no penalty."
Last night, a spokesman made it clear Sir Brian would not budge, since he "continues to enjoy the full confidence of the Prime Minister, his Secretary of State and Sir Gus O'Donnell, the head of the Civil Service."
Former Farming Minister Lord Bach and RPA chief executive Johnston McNeill lost their jobs over the payments fiasco.
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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