Health minister fails to list link with son's job
Ted Jeory
CONCERNS were raised last night after the Sunday Express found Health Minister Ann Keen had failed to declare a potential conflict of interest over her son’s drugs company.
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Express.co.uk
Mark Lloyd-Fox, 42, is “director of government affairs” at Swiss-based Rapid Pharmaceuticals.

Its website states: “Mr Lloyd-Fox’s role is to secure the active participation of governments.

“He enjoys a wide range of political contacts at the highest levels of government in the UK, European Union and within the Commonwealth.”

Although Mrs Keen knew about her son’s job a year ago she failed to declare it to civil servants.

The oversight appears to breach the ministerial code of conduct, which states: “Ministers must provide their Permanent Secretary with a full list in writing of all interests which might be thought to give rise to a conflict.

“It should also cover interests of the Minister’s close family which might be thought to give rise to a conflict.” It is understood that Mrs Keen only declared the interest after questions from the Sunday Express on Friday.

A Health Department source said: “She admits she was wrong. But there has been nothing untoward. Not many people even knew she had a son.”

Her office strongly denied there had been any wrongdoing. Officials said they were “not aware” of any correspondence or dialogue between the department and her son’s company, which develops drugs for HIV/Aids, Alzheimer’s and heart disease. They also emphasised it was a new company with no licensed products.

When the Sunday Express tried contacting former property developer Mr Lloyd-Fox, a company official said he was in London on business.

He added that they did not yet have any contracts in Britain, but declined to say if they would bid for any, saying it was “commercially confidential”.

Rapid Pharmaceuticals chief executive Michael Laznicka said yesterday that the website was out of date and Mr Lloyd-Fox’s title had changed three months ago to “vice-president of global partnerships and coalitions”.

He added that Mr Lloyd-Fox had not had any “formal” meetings with his mother or any other British government officials.

Mr Lloyd-Fox, who uses his mother’s maiden name after she gave him up for adoption when she was 17, was formerly director of the Commonwealth Institute in London.

He was reunited with his mother, now 61, in 1995 and worked as her researcher when she was one of Gordon Brown’s closest aides. Six years ago, he was warned by police over threatening night-time phone calls to councillors in Alan Keen’s west London constituency of Feltham and Heston after they rejected his plans to redevelop an old people’s home.

Mrs Keen became a minister in 2007. Although she and her husband Alan have a house in west London, they claimed second home allowances for an apartment in the centre of the capital, nearer Westminster.

In a statement yesterday, the Department of Health said: “Ann Keen has no ministerial responsibility for pharmaceutical policy or the pharmaceutical industry and has not been involved in any decisions in this area since she became a minister.

“As far as we are aware there has been no contact at ministerial or official level between the department and Rapid Pharmaceuticals since Ann Keen became a minister and no conflict of interest has arisen since her appointment as a result of her son’s position.”

“She has written to the Permanent Secretary formally declaring her son’s position with Rapid Pharmaceuticals.”

Shadow Cabinet Offi ce Minister Francis Maude said last night: “This matter ought to have been declared much earlier. With the loss of interest in politics on the increase, it is doubly important that ministers are transparent in declaring potential conflicts of interest.”