Boris Johnson axes five senior advisers in ‘bloody’ cull of his City Hall team

 
Jobs cull: Mayor Boris Johnson
Pippa Crerar28 May 2012

Boris Johnson was accused of carrying out a cull of his senior advisors at City Hall today.

Five high-profile figures from his first term have not been reappointed as the Mayor tightens up his top team. They include mentoring ambassador Ray Lewis, health and families adviser Pam Chesters and efficiencies czar Nicholas Griffin. Director of environment

Kulveer Ranger and volunteering adviser Lizzie Noel have also gone ­—although they will be replaced.

Between them they earned almost £450,000. All the advisers were paid apart from Mr Lewis, who was sacked as deputy mayor over misconduct allegations at the start of Mr Johnson’s first term and returned to City Hall on a voluntary basis.

One senior Tory insider said: “It’s been very bloody. A few of them didn’t really see it coming so it really feels like a cull.” Another added: “Boris can be incredibly loyal to his people — sometimes too much so — but he can also be ruthless when he needs to be.”

Mr Johnson has long aimed to cut costs at the Greater London Authority and create a more streamlined team.

All his senior staff were on contracts which expired at the end of his first term but the majority of them have been renewed.

Over the next four years he will have to deliver multi-billion-pound savings across all his areas of responsibility, including police and transport.

He has one more appointment to make but after that his team will be complete. One will run Team London — the Mayor’s programme to boost volunteering — and responsibilities will include fundraising as well as finding new recruits. The job is expected to go to a high-profile figure who will then lead a team of professionals.

Mr Johnson is understood to be disappointed by the lack of progress in recruiting mentors during his first four years in power.

It comes after senior BBC political journalist Will Walden was appointed as Mr Johnson’s communications chief.

Mr Walden replaces Guto Harri, another ex-BBC man, who quit to take up a post with News International.

Mr Ranger, who plans to go travelling, has already been replaced by political adviser Matthew Pencharz and his responsibilities for cycling handed over to deputy mayor for transport Isabel Dedring.

Len Duvall, Labour leader on the London Assembly, said: “It doesn’t really matter who comes or goes from the Mayor’s team. It is clear Boris Johnson aims to do very little over the next four years and he is not on top of his own agenda.”

A spokesman for the Mayor said: “It’s part of the ongoing cost-cutting that Boris introduced four years ago. He is consistently trying to make the whole organisation more cost-effective and efficient.”

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