A woman is suing the Government after she was sacked for blowing the whistle about the UK’s handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Subscribe to our daily newsletter!
Josie Stewart, who is originally from Market Drayton, was sacked from the civil service last year following an anonymous interview she gave to the BBC.
The 42-year-old worked at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) for seven years, two of which were at the British Embassy in Kabul.
Ms Stewart said she decided to take action when misleading statements were made that she said undermined evidence given to Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Select Committee during an inquiry. She was dismissed during a “long and painful process” after her bosses became aware that she had given the interview.
Now the former senior official says she will be taking the government to court in the hope she can establish a legal right for civil servants to blow the whistle when the public interest requires it.
“For me it’s really important whether I win or not.” Ms Stewart said, “If I do win, then the most important thing is it would create a shift within government because politicians and ministers would know that if they lie, then civil servants can say so and not lose their jobs.”
Ms Stewart claims that Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary of the time, rebuffed a testimony made by a 25-year-old junior diplomat about the Kabul evacuation, dismissing it as inaccurate. This led to Ms Stewart submitting evidence of her...
Dangote Group has dismissed as false and malicious a publication alleging that its President, Aliko Dangote, distanced himself from Tony Elumelu, describing the report as entirely baseless. In a s...