The Conservatives have demanded a further investigation into the culture secretary Lisa Nandy over a failure to disclose donations from the new head of the football watchdog.
Ms Nandy apologised after Sir William Shawcross, commissioner for public appointments, ruled on Thursday that the government’s appointment in October of David Kogan as chair of the new Independent Football Regulator breached the code on public appointments three times.
He said Mr Kogan had donated to the leadership campaigns of both Sir Keir Starmer and Ms Nandy, but this had not been disclosed.
As well as Ms Nandy’s failure to disclose his £2,900 donation to her 2020 leadership campaign previously, the potential conflict of interest arising from that was not discussed with Mr Kogan at the interview, and his links to the Labour Party were not revealed, the report said.
Former broadcasting executive Mr Kogan was not on the original shortlist, was a director of LabourList – the independent pro-Labour news site – and has written two books about the party.
Following its conclusion, Sir Keir Starmer reprimanded Ms Nandy by saying “the process followed was not entirely up to the standard expected” but said she had “acted in good faith”.
The Conservatives have now written to Daniel Greenberg, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, to formally complain about Ms Nandy’s failure to declare donations and to call for a further inquiry.
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Conservative Party chair Kevin Hollinrake said in the letter that there were two £1,450 donations in 2020 to Ms Nandy’s campaign, which he said were “clearly from the same source”, with one from Mr Kogan personally and another from David Kogan Ltd, which he controls.
Each fell just below the £1,500 declaration threshold, which Conservative Party chairman Kevin Hollinrake said “appears deliberately designed to conceal the total from the public”.
He queried whether Sir Keir also received similar donations and said this “raises serious questions about Keir Starmer’s judgement”.
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Sir William’s report said the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) should have publicly disclosed Mr Kogan’s political activity.
He particularly highlighted the £33,410 donated by him and his company to the Labour Party and Labour candidates in the five years prior.
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Ms Nandy said on Sunday that her department disclosed the information “on a number of occasions”, including during his interview.
“It just wasn’t discussed that he donated specifically to me because I didn’t know about that,” she told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg show, as she explained she was doing leadership hustings and donations were not handled by her.
She said Mr Kogan had not recalled having donated to her either, but as soon as it was discovered, she “put that information into the public domain and recused myself from the process”.
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Ms Nandy said there was a failure to “add a line to a particular press release about David Kogan having donated previously to the Labour Party”.
The minister denied that the incident made a farce of Labour’s manifesto pledge to clean up public life.
She insisted she took “full responsibility” for the process and said Mr Kogan was approached by the previous Conservative government, “who began this process” for the role.
The Conservatives have already written to Sir Laurie Magnus, the prime minister’s ethics watchdog, calling for Sir Keir to face further scrutiny over Mr Kogan’s donations to the PM during the 2020 leadership race, and a £2,500 donation to the PM’s constituency Labour Party in the run-up to last year’s election.
Mr Burghart has asked whether the PM had “exactly the same conflict of interest, if not a greater one [than his culture secretary], given the 2024 general election donation”.
He suggested Sir Keir’s “extensive hospitality from the football industry” meant he should have recused himself from the entire process of appointing Mr Kogan.
Mr Kogan, in response to the findings, said he had never been “aware of any deviation from best practice” in the appointment process and could “now draw a line under the process”.
