Review of the Defence Communications Directorate’s response to Declassified UK
An independent review into allegations that the Defence Communications Directorate refused to engage with the media outlet, Declassified UK.
Documents
Details
Covering letter from Chief Operating Officer, Mike Baker
On 21 September, the Secretary of State made a statement to the House on reports regarding an approach taken by the Ministry of Defence with a media outlet (Declassified UK) where he noted that all Government media and communication professionals must abide by the Government Communication Service’s Propriety Guidance and the Civil Service Code.
In that statement, he committed to an independent review by former director and communications professional Tom Kelly into allegations that had been made that those standards had not always been met in the Department.
Mr Kelly led the independent review during October 2020, and I am pleased to publish his report with this letter. I am reassured that the Ministry of Defence does not operate any blacklisting policy and has no direct political bias. This is an important finding. However, the report does identify lessons to be learned. As MOD Chief Operating Officer, I fully accept the findings of the report, and we are now in the process of taking forward its recommendations. I will ensure this is done at pace.
I would like again to apologise to Declassified UK for the incident. MOD was wrong not to provide a comment to them on the story about which they were enquiring in August 2020.
My thanks go to Mr Kelly for agreeing to conduct the review and his insightful report.