LONDON

Over the last two weeks, a simmering conflict between the British government and the civil service has boiled over into open conflict.

U.K. Home Secretary Priti Patel was openly accused of bullying her staff by the department’s top-ranking civil servant, Sir Philip Rutnam, who resigned in spectacular fashion last month and has now taken the government to court.

The turmoil has engulfed not only the Home Office but the wider British government, and shone a spotlight on the often-tense relationship between elected politicians and unelected bureaucrats.

Rutnam goes rogue

On Feb. 29, Rutnam dramatically resigned from his position as permanent secretary at the Home Office after clashing repeatedly with Patel, and said he would sue for constructive dismissal.

The permanent secretary is the highest-ranking civil servant in government ministries, and constructive dismissal is when one resigns due to a hostile work environment, meaning their resignation was not genuinely voluntary.

The manner of his resignation was unprecedented, as civil servants portray themselves as politically independent and shun the media spotlight. Rutnam announced his resignation in a news conference, a highly unusual move.

A civil servant for 33 years, Rutnam accused Patel of a “vicious and orchestrated campaign against him.”

“The home secretary categorically denied any involvement in this campaign to the Cabinet Office. I regret I do not believe her. She has not made the effort I would expect to dissociate herself from the comments,” he said.

“I believe these events give me very strong grounds to claim constructive, unfair dismissal, and I will be pursuing that claim in the courts,” he said.

“One of my duties as permanent secretary was to protect the health, safety and well-being of our 35,000 people. This created tension with the home secretary, and I have encouraged her to change her behaviors,” he said.

“I have received allegations that her conduct has included shouting and swearing, belittling people, making unreasonable and repeated demands – behavior that created fear and that needed some bravery to call out.”

Rutnam is not without controversy, with the Home Office suffering a series of leaks to the media under his tenure, as well as the Windrush scandal, which saw at least 83 people of Caribbean descent wrongfully deported from the U.K.

Then-Home Secretary Amber Rudd was forced to resign in the wake of the scandal for apparently misleading parliament by saying that there were no targets for removing illegal immigrants, but it turned out officials within her department failed to give her the correct information. Rutnam was spared personal responsibility, if only by a slim margin.

He said the treatment he suffered at Patel’s hands was “part of a wider pattern in government,” and has since begun legal action against Patel and the government. If the case came to court, Patel would have to give evidence under oath.

Patel under pressure

Patel denied all allegations of wrongdoing, but local media have reported leaks of other civil servants alleging they were bullied by her.

Local media reported that a former aide to Patel was given £25,000 ($33,000) after threatening to launch a lawsuit that named her. The aide accused her of shouting with “unprovoked aggression” and “without warning,” before removing the aide. The aide took an overdose of prescription medicine in 2015 due to the alleged bullying.

Patel, who was minister of state for employment at the Department of Work and Pensions at the time, reportedly told the aide to “get lost” and “get out of her face.”

Before becoming home secretary, as secretary of state for international development from mid 2016 to late 2017, Patel was accused of harassing and belittling a third senior civil servant. A witness to the events is willing to testify at Rutnam’s employment tribunal, BBC Newsnight reported. She also reportedly described her staff as “[expletive] useless.”

She was fired as the international development secretary for having secret meetings with Israeli officials while on vacation in that country.

There were also reports that she tried to fire the Home Office’s director of communications on Christmas Eve. The attempt failed, but the civil servant in question eventually took early retirement.

There were then leaked claims that the domestic spy agency MI5 restricted Patel’s access to sensitive information because it did not trust her, a claim the government vehemently denied.

Opposition seize the opportunity

“To end up with one of the most senior public servants in the country taking court action against one of the great offices of state shows a shocking level of breakdown in the normal functioning of government,” said Yvette Cooper, a Labour MP and chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee.

“For the home secretary and prime minister to have allowed things to reach this point is appalling, especially at a time when the Home Office faces crucial challenges with rising violent crime, forthcoming counter-terror legislation, new immigration laws, and sensitive negotiations on post-Brexit security cooperation.”

“We cannot afford to have a dysfunctional and distracted Home Office while this tribunal is going on,” she said, adding: "The Home Office is too important a department to function with a poisoned relationship between the home secretary and her civil servants.”

The center-left, main opposition Labour Party has demanded Patel stand down and that a “genuinely independent” inquiry be held.

“I’m afraid it would be better if she stood down,” Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott said. “We are calling on her to step down while the inquiry goes on.”

“This is about one of the great departments of state,” she added. “You cannot have the home secretary at odds with her senior officials in this way.”

Dave Penman, head of the FDA, the union for senior civil servants, said Prime Minister Boris Johnson had allowed his ministers to smear leading civil servants.

“Civil servants need to be able to give ministers impartial, evidence-based, professional advice. Whilst that is not always welcome, it is essential for good government,” Penman said.

“What we are witnessing now is becoming a new norm. It’s also increasingly clear that this modus operandi is being led by No 10 and those around the prime minister,” he added.

Boris backs ‘Prit‘

During Prime Minister’s Questions, Johnson backed Patel, saying: “The home secretary is doing an outstanding job: delivering change, putting police on the streets, cutting crime and delivering a new immigration system – and I’m sticking by her.”

Johnson said it was right that all allegations of bullying were investigated, and that that was what was happening. In a stringent defense of his home secretary, he added: “She is keeping this country safe by putting in record numbers of police officers.”

Johnson later double-downed in a separate TV interview, saying he would “stick with Prit.”

The prime minister’s controversial chief aide Dominic Cummings has long stated his distaste for the country’s civil service, which he sees as too slow to act and unprepared to take the risks needed to “level up” the country. At worst, he sees the civil service as obstructing government ministers’ attempts to implement their agendas.

Cummings has set his sights particularly on government special advisors, and publicly appealed for “weirdos and misfits” to apply for government positions to shake up the civil service and bring in fresh perspectives.

Thus far, the government has been unwavering in its support of Patel.

On Friday, almost 100 people who worked with Patel signed an open letter publicly defending her from the bullying allegations.

The letter, published in the Daily Telegraph, which backs the ruling, center-right Conservative Party, said Patel has being subject to "an extraordinary campaign of gossip and smears, conducted by anonymous individuals via secret briefings and innuendo.”

The letter said the 92 signatories had all worked with Patel, including “at time of stress and high emotion.”

"We do not recognise the picture that has been painted of her this week," the letter said.

"She is certainly a tough, assertive and effective leader, but even under extreme pressure she has never crossed a line or lost her temper,” it added.

"She gives her all for this country and deserves far better treatment than she has received,” the letter said. “Those of us who have been employed by her at difficult times in our lives – during illness, a personal crisis or bereavement – also know how caring and compassionate she can be."