Rishi Sunak has been told it is “not credible” to deny that David Cameron received special favours when lobbied the Treasury to help the doomed finance firm Greensill.
At a stormy evidence session, MPs scoffed at the chancellor’s claim that no more attention was paid to the former prime minister than to an approach by any other person or organisation.
Mr Sunak insisted he and the Treasury spent only “a very small amount of time” on the plea for help, telling the inquiry: “I don’t know David Cameron very well.”
But Mel Stride, the Treasury committee’s Tory chair, said: “It just doesn’t seem credible if it was a former prime minister pushing something as vigorously as he did, at the very highest level.”
And Labour MP Siobhain McDonagh pointed out the furious lobbying amounted to “25 texts, 12 WhatsApps, 8 emails, 11 calls and 9 meetings with senior ministers and officials”.
“Can you name me another company that got that amount of access at the height of the crisis?” she demanded to know.
Text messages released in April revealed that Mr Sunak “pushed” officials to explore helping Greensill join in a multimillion-pound Covid-19 support scheme.
And, when the decision was finally taken not to proceed, he personally phoned Mr Cameron to break the news to him.
The former prime minister lobbied ministers and officials 56 times over four months as he tried to persuade the government to give Greensill access to the Covid Corporate Financing Facility (CCCF).
The firm wanted it to include supply chain finance – to enable businesses to be paid promptly during the recession – but the Bank of England would have taken a hit if its clients ran out of money.
In one text to Mr Sunak, Mr Cameron said: “Rishi, David Cameron here. Can I have a very quick word at some point.
“HMT are refusing to extend CCFF to include supply chain finance … There is a simple misunderstanding that I can explain. Thanks DC.”
But Mr Sunak said: “The identity of the person talking about it was not relevant to the amount of attention and proper due diligence that the issue got and required.”
Greensill’s proposal “probably occupied among the least amount of our time”, as he and Charles Roxburgh, the Treasury’s second permanent secretary, wrestled with the Covid crisis.
“It was a very small amount of my time, it was a very small amount of Charles’ time, compared to the multiple other interventions that we pursued at the time,” he told the inquiry.
Mr Sunak added: “Ultimately we decided not to take this forward, but it was absolutely right to do due diligence.”
And he described telling Mr Cameron he would “push” officials as “just a turn of phrase”, telling the MPs: “I wouldn’t read too much into that.”
