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Public affairs group Flint World has appointed former Labour minister James Purnell as its new chief government, because the lobbying trade bolsters its ranks with Labour specialists forward of subsequent month’s election.
Purnell, who served as tradition secretary in Gordon Brown’s administration, will be part of Flint World in October.
He’ll take over the chief management of the enterprise from co-founders Sir Simon Fraser, former everlasting secretary on the Overseas Workplace, and Ed Richards, who beforehand led media regulator Ofcom.
UK lobbying outfits {and professional} providers companies are more and more hiring employees with hyperlinks to the opposition social gathering, because the trade beefs up its Labour experience forward of the election on July 4 that polls forecast will probably be received by Sir Keir Starmer’s social gathering.
Lobbying companies are so eager to draw figures with Labour hyperlinks, they’ve been prepared to pay above-market costs, trade figures have mentioned.
Fraser, who will stay on Flint World’s board with co-founder Richards and can nonetheless take care of purchasers, instructed the Monetary Occasions that the agency was “after all acutely aware of the potential political evolution within the nation”, however added that “it’s not the only cause by any means why we selected [Purnell]”.
After leaving authorities in 2009, the place he latterly served as work and pensions secretary, Purnell grew to become a senior adviser at Boston Consulting Group earlier than changing into director of technique and digital on the BBC in 2013. He has since left the broadcaster, and has been president and vice-chancellor of the College of the Arts London since 2021.
Fraser mentioned Flint World’s purchasers had been “very eager to grasp the place Labour goes. They’re asking questions on how, within the fiscal circumstances that we face, the federal government goes to have the ability to obtain progress.”
He added that “clearly they’ve a variety of issues”, specifically round tax and employment legislation. “However broadly talking they take a constructive method to vary if it delivers a pro-business authorities and a political context they will function in. Stability and continuity is what they prize above all,” he mentioned.
The agency additionally employed Sam White, Starmer’s former chief of employees, as a “specialist accomplice” earlier this 12 months.
Based in 2015, Flint World advises traders and companies on coverage, regulation, politics and competitors points. It has places of work in London, Brussels, Paris, Dublin, Singapore and Hong Kong. Development Capital Companions, a London-based non-public fairness home, took a minority stake within the firm on the finish of 2021.
Flint World posted complete revenues of £34.8mn in 2022, a rise of about 50 per cent on the earlier 12 months, and a pre-tax revenue of £1.4mn, in keeping with its newest set of accounts revealed at Firms Home. Fraser mentioned the agency’s underlying revenues continued to develop in 2023.
