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Ousted former Prime Minister Liz Truss is allegedly refusing to hand over casework to the new Labour MP who defeated her in July, prompting claims that the disgraced ex-MP may be breaching data protection laws.
Recently-elected Labour MP Terry Jermy told Byline Times that Liz Truss had failed to help him with the transition to being the new MP. It is seemingly a break with the convention where ousted MPs hand over casework to smooth the transition to a new representative for constituents. Jermy has branded the situation “very odd”.
“Nothing has been handed over to me. I have had residents forward previous emails independently, but that’s them being diligent. There’s been nothing from Truss’s team,” he said.
“So [her team] has either completed everything, which I don’t believe, or they’ve just closed all the cases. They might well have been doing stuff in the immediate aftermath of the election. But you’d have expected them to hand it over by now,” the Norfolk MP added.
Speaking on PoliticsHome‘s podcast this week, Jermy added: “I’ve not had any [handover]. I’ve had two press releases issued by the Liz Truss team having a go at me since the election.”
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“The fact that I’m intending to hold surgeries, some residents find that shocking, because we’ve not had it,” he added.
But it was Liz Truss’ team’s response to the claims in Politico which intrigues the most.
A spokesperson for former South West Norfolk MP Truss told the online outlet on Friday: “Liz is diligently completing outstanding casework. Of course, due to data protection laws she cannot simply hand over constituents’ confidential information.”
Several political and data experts have questioned the claim that handing over casework would be a breach of data protection laws. In fact, it may be the exact opposite.
Data protection expert Mark Mossley replied: “I’ve implemented GDPR at several places. The data has been provided to ‘the MP for…’ rather than ‘Liz Truss the person’”.
He claimed that as Truss has now changed roles, she “no longer has any right to access it.”
“In doing so, and refusing to hand it over to the new custodian of the office and therefore the data, she’s committing an offence,” he alleged.
Political scientist Dr Nick Dickinson replied to Byline Times: “I highly doubt she’s still doing case work. But this is deeply irresponsible even if she was.”
Terry Jermy MP said: “I don’t know how if the casework is being dealt with, or if it’s legitimate in terms of GDPR.”
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He is particularly baffled how Truss is handling casework after being defeated, as messages to her old parliamentary email address get the automatic reply: “This email has been sent to a former Member of Parliament.”
Labour’s Jermy said: “I have had several constituents tell me they got an auto-reply saying Liz Truss’ office is now closed. I don’t even think her parliamentary email is still active.”
Several readers suggested that the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) should investigate the matter.
The Information Commissioner’s Office does have guidance explaining the handover process for elected representatives. It suggests outgoing politicians should get “consent” from constituents to transfer their case to the new MP. But data that no longer needs to be held must be destroyed.
It is now 43 days since the General Election that booted her from her seat, about the same length of time she was Prime Minister in 2022.
An ICO spokesperson told this newspaper: “Any MP who is not re-elected will be managing the transfer of constituents’ casework and data. We wouldn’t expect all constituency casework to be routinely transferred to the new MP.
“Instead the former MP should review their records and take steps to ensure they are passed to a new MP, or securely deleted. We have provided guidance to MPs on what to do when their term ends.”
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One voter noted: “My ex MP spent several weeks with her staff (before they were all made redundant…) working to pass cases to her replacement.”
Others more sarcastically suggested that the PM for 45 days was in “denial” about no longer being in Parliament, or that she was embarrassed about not actually having any casework to hand over to the new MP.
As one user on Threads noted: “I expect the dog ate it.” Another added: “I wonder if the backlog is embarrassingly large. I suspect her mission to “save” capitalism took up most of her time.”
“I think her ego is going to take a while to take in the realisation that she isn’t the MP for South West Norfolk anymore.”
Others were more forgiving: “I feel sorry for her, she can’t let go.”
Earlier this week, Liz Truss appeared in Beccles (Suffolk), and was interrupted by pranksters Led By Donkeys. A sign appeared behind her on the stage with an image of a lettuce with the words: “I crashed the economy.” The lettuce refers to the Daily Star stunt which saw a supermarket-bought lettuce outlast Truss’ short tenure in office.
Liz Truss was booted out by her party after her disastrous 2022 ‘mini’ budget featuring tax cuts which were viewed by the markets as “uncosted”, leading to panic, and triggering a spike in Government borrowing costs and interest rates.
Truss has also been in the US, recently attending the Republican National Convention to boost the re-standing criminal convict Donald Trump.
Journalist Matt Steinglass gave a suggested response for the new Labour MP: “Dear Liz, we appreciate all the casework you’ve done in the past but in future, please lettuce do the work.”
Liz Truss’ team was contacted for comment. The House of Commons authorities declined to comment on an individual case.
Update 17th August: This piece has been amended to note that the Led by Donkeys stunt was in Beccles, not the Edinburgh Fringe.
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