Bank of America – UK’s Johnson picks new chief of workers to guide post-Cummings ‘reset’

LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson appointed Dan Rosenfield, a enterprise advisor and former treasury official, as his new chief of workers on Thursday as he tries to revive belief in his management.

Johnson is reshaping his senior workforce of advisers following the departure of Dominic Cummings earlier this month. Cummings was seen because the driving pressure behind Johnson’s technique on Brexit and most different insurance policies, and his exit has been billed as an opportunity for a ‘reset’ for the British chief.

Rosenfield joins from Hakluyt, a strategic advisory agency for companies and traders, the place he has been world head of company purchasers and head of the UK enterprise since 2016, the federal government stated.

He beforehand labored at Bank of America as a managing director of funding banking, and spent over a decade working within the finance ministry the place he served as a senior aide to former finance ministers Alistair Darling and George Osborne.

“Dan is a class act and an inspired appointment,” stated Rupert Harrison, a former aide to Osborne who now works for Blackrock. He described Rosenfield as shiny, robust and politically savvy.

Johnson has been closely criticised for his response to the COVID-19 disaster and a failure to speak correctly with elected members of his ruling Conservative Celebration, which has stirred revolt over lockdown guidelines and Brexit insurance policies.

The choice to rent a comparatively low profile former civil servant marks a change of course for a major minister whose inside circle was beforehand largely made up of alumni from the 2016 Brexit marketing campaign, with Cummings on the fore.

The chief of workers is historically probably the most highly effective political appointment within the prime minister’s workplace. Although actual tasks differ in accordance the leaders’ choice, the job includes offering strategic and political recommendation to assist the prime minister take selections.

Rosenfield will start work on Dec. 7 and formally take up the Chief of Workers position on Jan. 1, Downing Street stated.