Labour Investment minister Lord Stockwood has told a panel at the Confederation of British Industry conference that it is a “terrible idea” for businesspeople to be in government. According to him this is because the civil servants are so brilliant…
He said this morning:
“I sit in both the Treasury team, Rachel and Peter’s team in DBR and I’m with the Corporate No. 10, usually Varun in No10.
And so again, we now have to navigate the system to make sure we’re having the conversations.
But the bottom line to that is that it’s really important, having only been in government for three months, is that I hear business leaders talking about, and particularly partners talking about, business people should run government. Let me tell you, that would be a terrible idea. It’s a terrible idea for Government.
You need more commercial people in government, absolutely. And we need people who add on the other side of negotiations. So a number of deals that we’ve been doing where I think you need to be very commercial to realise where investors want to both meet their supply and demand side. But actually there are a myriad of skills and capabilities that great civil servants bring to the table as well.
So again, it’s been a bit of a learning for me. The first thing you want to do is recognise that we definitely need more commercial expertise. But the power of civil servants has been brilliant and has been really supportive and really helpful in things like legislation, in things like looking at the right processes to ensure that we’re considering things the right way.”
Stockwood has a long enough tech/business career behind him including a stint as managing director of match.com. Is he feeling out of his depth in government?
![Milwaukee Brewers’ Karen Fired After Confrontation with LA Dodgers Fan Goes Viral [WATCH]](https://www.right2024.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Milwaukee-Brewers-Karen-Fired-After-Confrontation-with-LA-Dodgers-Fan-350x250.jpg)
