I realise that I’ve written reams on LinkedIn, but nothing here, to reflect the ignominious departure of Information Commissioner, John Edwards. This is cobbled together from those posts.
Very early on the morning of 19 June, Information Commissioner John Edwards announced on LinkedIn an intention to resign, citing “poor judgement and…attempts at humour that were inappropriate and caused offence”.
This was in reference to the “independent workplace investigation” into his conduct, which had led to his stepping aside from his duties at the end of February: a fact which the ICO kept from the public, and from most of its own staff, for several weeks (might others have come forward in that time, had they known more?), and which they only publicly acknowledged after Edwards posted about the investigation on LinkedIn.
Edwards’ comments appear to have had the effect of stealing a march on the ICO’s and the government’s own communications. They were picked up by a lot media and commentators and run as “resignation over inappropriate humour”.
But, by the end of the day, the Secretary of State for his sponsor department, Science, Innovation and Technology, Liz Kendall, had revealed that, much more than that, she had
seen evidence of the vulgar and highly sexualised language that was used in his interactions with his staff and am extremely concerned that he continues to describe these incidents as misplaced humour. Multiple women shared testimony to the investigator on feeling offended, shocked and uncomfortable following interactions with Mr Edwards.
The ICO then put out a statement on 20 June, saying that
Mr Edwards’ actions were completely at odds with our values. We do not accept sexual harassment, bullying or discrimination in any form and have clear policies in place to deal with issues such as these.
And then, on 22 June, MLex reported (£) that
Despite the ICO’s relative silence, comments about the workplace culture at Britain’s privacy regulator have been increasingly common since the investigation started, even if most remarks were made privately…MLex understands Edwards was often described as “a bully” by current and former ICO employees. Beyond complaints of harassment and dismissive treatment of staff, a disproportionate growth in the numbers of staff at director and executive director levels while lower-grade staff were under extreme stress was also pointed out as a key factor contributing to a poor workplace environment.
Quite frankly this is a disgrace. My sympathy is with those who had to work with him in what appears to have been a toxic environment.
And questions still hang over this: how long has this behaviour been known about? and by whom?
The views in this post (and indeed most posts on blog) are my personal ones, and do not represent the views of any organisation I am involved with.
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