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A ministerial aide was fired Thursday night after the Conservative chief sent a letter with mixed wording in a “Canarian trap” designed to catch whoever leaked it.
Andrew Lewer, a parliamentary private secretary at the Home Office, was fired from his lower government role when a letter asking recipients not to leak information to the press reached the Guido Fawkes website.
But it is understood that the letter, from the whip boss, Mark Spencer, was worded slightly differently for each recipient, so that officials could know which version reached the media.
Lewer, PPS of Police Minister Kit Malthouse, denied leaking the letter when confronted with conservative whips, but suggested it could have been from a member of his staff.
He told the Politico website: “In almost 20 years of elective mandate, I have never leaked to the press.” The Guardian has reached out to Lewer for comment.
The letter, sent to all PPS and vice presidents of the Conservative Party, told recipients – or, at least, it told Lewer – that “there appears to be a lack of clarity in what is expected of you in your post as parliamentary secretary. private or vice president … I would like to take this opportunity to remind you of the serious consequences you will face if you decide to violate the [Ministerial] Code.”
He went on to say that the prime minister’s foreword to the code “strictly prohibits ‘leaking’ or any other breach of trust.”
The letter was quickly leaked to Guido Fawkes and published under the heading: “LEAKS: CHIEF OF WHIP WRITES NO LEAK WARNING TO PPS.”
It is not clear which parts of the letter were modified to catch the leaker, but the full text was published as part of the Guido Fawkes story.
Ministers cannot claim that they have not been warned about the possibility of such a method being used to identify potential leaks. Last month, No. 10 reported that he could use a “canary trap”Strategy in an attempt to identify the source of the leaks. That ploy was seen by some Westminster watchers are unlikely to do so as it had been announced to the press.
Despite attempts by former aide No. 10 Dominic Cummings to crack down on the leaks, with firing threats for any advisers found to have given information to the press, the government has so far been unable to crack down on the leaks since won re-election.
A Cabinet Office investigation is underway to find the “talking rat” who passed the plans for the second shutdown to the press before they were finalized.
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