THE UK Government broke the law when it handed a contract to a company whose bosses were friends of Dominic Cummings, a High Court judge has ruled.
Campaigners took legal action against Michael Gove's Cabinet Office over the decision to pay more than £500,000 of taxpayers' money to market research firm Public First, following the start of the coronavirus crisis in March 2020, and questioned the involvement of Cummings.
Lawyers representing the Good Law Project said Cummings, Prime Minister Boris Johnson's then-chief adviser, wanted focus group and communications support services work to be given to a company whose bosses were his friends.
Ministers, and Cummings – who left Downing Street late in 2020 – disputed the Good Law Project's claim.
Justice O'Farrell, who is based in London, considered rival arguments at a virtual High Court hearing in February and delivered a ruling on Wednesday.
The judge said in her ruling: "The claimant is entitled to a declaration that the decision of 5 June 2020 to award the contract to Public First gave rise to apparent bias and was unlawful."
Rachel Wolf, who owns and runs Public First with her husband, James Frayne, had previously worked as an adviser to Johnson, Cummings and Gove, and co-wrote the Tory manifesto for the 2019 general election.
Jo Maugham, director of the Good Law Project, said: "This is not Government for the public good – it is Government for the good of friends of the Conservative Party.
"We just don't understand how the Prime Minister can run a Cabinet that acts without proper regard for the law or value for public money.
"Government has claimed there was no favouritism in the awarding of contracts. But the High Court has held an informed observer would conclude otherwise."
A spokesman for Public First commented: "We're deeply proud of the work we did in the early stages of the pandemic, which helped save lives.
"The judge rejected most of the Good Law Project's claims, not finding actual bias in the awarding of this work, nor any problems with the pace or scale of the award.
"Rather, the judge found that weak internal processes gave rise to the appearance of bias. The judge made no criticism whatsoever of Public First anywhere in the judgment."
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