10 Downing Street needs a decorator to modernise its interior. The residence of the British Prime Minister since 1735 is suffering the ailments of three centuries of existence characterised by the constant movement of residents, meetings at the highest level and periodic crises. But none of its … The tenants can take on this operation, which would require years of work, given the instability of recent times. Curiously, in this era of short stays, the permanence for two decades of a woman who seems to know everything about governments and ministers, their greatness and weaknesses, stands out. Tories and Labour come and go, while Sue Gray, 66, remains. If the polls are not wrong, this coming Thursday, Keir Starmer will recover the executive for the left. And she, as his announced Chief of Staff, will become one of the most powerful women in the United Kingdom.
Nothing foretold her irresistible rise to the top of the British executive branch. In fact, there is a certain Dickensian atmosphere in the biography of this veteran civil servant. The daughter of Irish emigrants, she grew up in Tottenham, the multicultural northern London district where serious interracial riots broke out in 2011. The death of her father, an antiques dealer by profession, complicated the family finances and deprived her of a university education. In the mid-seventies she entered the Civil Service, the Public Administration, where a long and uneventful career was predicted for her in the departments of transport, health, work and pensions.
But ambitious stories have unexpected plot twists. In 1980, Gray left her bureaucratic job to return to her homeland and marry Bill Conlon, a local country singer, a popular genre on the island, and run a bar in Newry, a border town especially affected by the Northern Irish conflict. This somewhat bizarre decision has fueled conspiracy theories that attributed him to some type of relationship with intelligence agencies and the fight against terrorism.
It is not known what actually happened in that pub, but it is certain that a year later she returned to London to resume her trade. In the 1990s she ran a job centre in Cricklewood, in the north-west of the capital. Yes, the story became a bit grey again, but only during the 1990s. At the end of the century, surprise surprise, she joined the Cabinet Office as head of the ethics and decorum team.
This supervisory task gave her much greater relevance than one might think given her title, and that middle-aged, discreet and efficient woman suddenly assumed enormous power to determine the political course of senior officials involved. in murky affairs. These were not specific cases. We already know the propensity of leaders to get their hands and those around them dirty.
Sue had no shortage of work. Among other matters, she intervened in the Plebgate scandal, which cost Andrew Mitchell, head of the Tory bench, his position, or the accusations against parliamentarian Damian Green, accused of using public computer media for private business. Her usual discretion was broken when in 2018 she was appointed permanent secretary of the Department of Finance in the Northern Ireland Executive. On this occasion, her return to origins was much more daring. Two years later, her bid to be appointed head of the Civil Service in Northern Ireland did not come to fruition. Apparently, as she herself revealed, the fear that she would assume too much power closed her doors.
Johnson’s whip
Her return to Whitehall, home of the Cabinet Office, once again put her in the eye of the storm. In December 2021, when she returned and took up her old job, the British, who had been forced into strict confinement to combat the pandemic, were crying out against the Prime Minister. The media had broadcast images of a dozen meetings between Boris Johnson and his family in which confinement measures had been violated and alcohol was abundant.
There are many speculations about his relationship with those involved, and once again there is no evidence. As in a good British political series, there was speculation about mutual pressure between the prime minister and the woman who preserves public ethics, with promises of positions to divert responsibility. There was also talk of poisoned atmospheres with the rumour that he clashed with Simon Case, then head of the Cabinet. In any case, the wave of discredit was so high that it swept away all those affected, including Johnson himself.
Those who have dealt with her say that no one knows how to undo wrongs, make documents disappear and make deals with the Justice system like she does.
Gray replaced Case, but on March 2 she resigned and two days later she moved into the shadow of the opposition by becoming chief of staff of the Labour Party. There was no audacity. The civil servant was not taking any risks and was betting on the winning horse. Rishi Sunak’s government was gasping for air and she had already decided that this time, yes, she would reach the top of the apparatus, where only the prime minister is accountable.
If its victory is confirmed, as the polls assure, the left will recover the executive after more than ten years of conservative majority with a team that is supposedly new and can easily make mistakes. The chief of staff provides experience and precise knowledge of the building’s plumbing. All those who have dealt with her assure that no one like her knows how to resolve wrongs and make documents volatile, agree with Justice and defend her people with all their might, no matter who they are. The daughter of immigrants reaches a male position that has usually been held by graduates from Oxford and Cambridge. Starmer will be happy and Dickens, too.
