Priti Patel, Britain’s home secretary, sought to remove her department’s top civil servant from his role amid “disagreements” between the pair.
Government officials confirmed on Thursday that Ms Patel had called on Downing Street to replace Philip Rutnam as the Home Office’s permanent secretary, a role he has held since April 2017.
Whitehall officials said relations between the pair had been poor for a number of months. Allies of Ms Patel said it was “natural” for a secretary of state and their permanent secretary to have “disagreements” and insisted there had been “no heated arguments” between the pair.
Multiple officials alleged in comments to The Times newspaper that Ms Patel had created an “atmosphere of fear” in her department and accused her of “encouraging behaviour outside the rule of law”.
Allies of Ms Patel strongly rejected allegations of bullying on Thursday, with one saying: “They are completely false and unfounded. She is a demanding Home Secretary and people expect nothing less.”
A Home Office spokesperson added: “We have not received any formal complaints and we take the welfare of our staff extremely seriously.”
One departmental official collapsed last week following a meeting with Ms Patel, in which she asked what action the Home Office could take after a judicial review prevented the deportation of 25 Jamaican nationals. Allies of Ms Patel said she had simply asked her officials how the situation had been allowed to happen.
But Dave Penman, general secretary of the FDA civil servants’ trade union, said staff at the Home Office were “working flat out” and called on ministers “to recognise the consequences of their behaviour”.
He said: “The Home Office, by its very nature, has a wide-reaching, demanding policy agenda, and civil servants working in the department are used to rising to these challenges.
“Members in the Home Office are already working flat out, with our latest survey finding 70 per cent within the department felt the working of excess hours is a problem, with the same amount stating they had worked whilst on sick leave in the last year.”
Mr Penman said putting undue pressure and demands on committed public servants who were already overstretched did not make for good government and would do the government no favours in delivering policies.
“Ministers have to recognise the consequences of their behaviour. An ‘atmosphere of fear’ is obviously not conducive to a successful workplace and anonymous briefings against civil servants who cannot answer back are not only unfair to the individual. They corrode public trust in government.”
Nadhim Zahawi, a business minister, defended Ms Patel on Thursday as “brilliant and collegiate” and someone who is “utterly professional and works night and day to deliver for the country and her constituents”.
Asked on LBC radio if he believed she was “a bully”, Mr Zahawi replied: “No, I don’t think she is at all.”
