LGBT+ groups are now “monomaniacally obsessed” with trans issues and the civil service is struggling to grapple with diversity and inclusion, a former special adviser has suggested.
Henry Newman, who worked in the Cabinet Office in the early 2010s and later provided advice to former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, sat down at a fringe event at the 2024 Tory Party conference on Monday to discuss efforts to make the civil service more accessible.
Since leaving No10, Newman has created a leading blog called “The Whitehall Project” as he looks to expose Labour’s links within the corridors of power.
However, in a lengthy conversation about equality, diversity and inclusion on Monday, Newman claimed that the civil service was failing to deliver.
LGBT+ groups in the civil service are now “monomaniacally obsessed” with trans issues as Whitehall struggles to grapple with diversity and inclusion, a former special adviser has suggestedGettyHe said: “I don’t think the civil service is getting it right at the moment, no. I don’t think the civil service or public sector is unique in that. I think it’s a much broader problem.
“Someone was asking perhaps provocatively yesterday [Sunday] whether the whole question of EDI and ESG work is an ultra low interest rate phenomenon and as we move out of that whether companies have to start focusing on other things. I think there is truth in that.”
He added: “I find declaring pronouns mildly absurd and the acronym soup very difficult to deal with. When I was working in the Cabinet Office and we were coming up with an early version of a diversity plan, this was back in the early 2010s, I found even the idea that my employer wanted to know with whom I sleep and collect data on sexuality mildly problematic.
“Why does an employer need to know that? It’s just weird. We want to be more inclusive, that’s great. But what happens if one particular department or one area of a department has too many or too few homosexuals? What is the goldilocks proportion of homosexuals in a department? We don’t even know in the country.”
Newman instead suggested it would prove more beneficial to provide civil servants with detailed training in public law and accountancy, later championing efforts taken during his stint in the Cabinet Office to improve access for disabled staff.
He added: “The requirement is instead diversity training. I’ve found it at best patronising and at worst fundamentally problematic.”
Jackie Doyle-Price attended More in Common's fringe eventGB NEWSHowever, the former special adviser had some wise words for Conservatives when it comes to how to engage with questions about equality, diversity and inclusion.
“Conservatives hate atomising people,” Newman explained. “We hate identifying as particular characteristics. I find my heckles get raised when I am described as a gay man when I am comfortable with my sexuality. That’s a challenge that we all face.
“I think the political difficulties for us, as this excellent polling reiterates, is clearly that we can't be seen to or allow our opponents to paint us as being against modern Britain.
“That’s a huge danger for us. And our messengers matter, as well as our messages. We have to make sure that we look and feel in keeping with modern Britain.”
He added: “Conservatives need to proceed carefully in this area because it’s easy to walk into a trap where we get pinned by our opponents into a corner and look like we’re not comfortable with ourselves.”
Newman instead warned that LGBT+ organisations more broadly were now increasingly becoming “monomaniacally obsessed” with trans issues, having previously fixated on a “mainstream position” by prioritising gay rights.
He also claimed: “The problem is the EDI industry has changed in the time we’ve been in Government and it is really quite unrecognisable.”
Newman’s comments come after a series of stories about so-called wokeness within the civil service and society more generally.
Ex-Common Sense Minister Esther McVey looked to streamline equality and diversity work in May.
However, it was revealed last month that some diversity and inclusion officers were paid more than top trade officials.
An astonishing £1.7million of taxpayers’ money was spent each year on hundreds of diversity networks to enable civil servants to connect with colleagues of the same race, religion, sexuality or lifestyle choices.
Former Health Minister Jackie Doyle-Price separately spoke out about how the “activist left” allegedly took over the levers of power in a “horrifying” row about same-sex wards in NHS hospitals.
She added: “As Conservatives going forward, we need to get back to being more outcome focused about gender, equality, inclusion and diversity.”
GB News has approached the Cabinet Office for comment.