In 1991, Geidt and Anthony de Normann sued the journalist John Pilger and Central Television over the documentary Cambodia: The Betrayal, in which they were accused of being members of the SAS secretly engaged in the training of the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia. Geidt and de Normann accepted "very substantial" damages and all costs.[17] In a related libel action Ann Clwyd MP, then shadow minister for overseas development, issued a public apology to Geidt and de Normann and agreed to meet all legal costs.[18]
Geidt was recruited to the Royal Household in 2002 as Assistant Private Secretary to the Queen. He was promoted to Deputy Private Secretary in 2005. He then served as the Queen's Private Secretary from 2007 to 2017.
Oman, BAE Systems, Schroders, King's College London
Geidt became chair of the Council of King's College London in 2016, took an advisory role in the arms, security and aerospace company BAE Systems until April 2021, and serves as chair of a board in the asset management company Schroders. According to the diaries of Sir Alan Duncan, Geidt worked for the Sultan of Oman. In November 2021, academic staff at King’s College London wrote publicly complaining that Geidt had failed to disclose and manage conflicts of interest, breaching university policy. This included failure to state in the register of interests that he had been working for the Sultan of Oman, or manage conflicts with BAE Systems and Schroders, as the university had investments in BAE Systems up to 2020 and in Schroders, and had ‘multiple partnerships’ with Oman state bodies in medical care and dentistry.[32][33]
Adviser on Ministers' Interests
On 28 April 2021, it was announced that Prime MinisterBoris Johnson had appointed Geidt as the Independent Adviser on Ministers' Interests.[34]
On 28 May 2021, Geidt published a report on allegations surrounding the financing of refurbishments made to 11 Downing Street. The report concluded that Johnson did not breach the Ministerial Code and that no conflict of interest, or reasonably perceived conflict of interest, arose. However, Geidt expressed that it was "unwise" for Johnson to have proceeded with refurbishments without "more rigorous regard for how this would be funded".[35][36]
In December 2021 it was reported that Geidt was considering resigning his role as standards adviser for Johnson.[37][38][39] The Conservative Party was fined £17,800 for improperly declaring this donation. Shadow First Secretary of StateAngela Rayner called on Lord Geidt to reopen his investigation into funding of the refurbishment, and the Liberal Democrats have called for an independent public inquiry. Geidt's predecessor Sir Alex Allan resigned when his findings into alleged bullying of civil servants by Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, in November 2020, were overruled by Boris Johnson.[40]Nick Cohen commented in The Guardian that "Lord Geidt, Johnson's ministerial standards adviser, now cuts a pathetic figure. The credulous man actually believed the prime minister when he said he knew nothing about a businessman buddy, Lord Brownlow, paying for the refurbishment of his Downing Street flat until the media mentioned it in February 2021."[41] On 12 January 2022, in the House of Commons, MP Chris Bryant described Lord Geidt's reputation as "tarnished" by his involvement with Johnson.[42]
In his annual report of May 2022, Geidt said that he had avoided offering unprompted advice to Boris Johnson about the latter's obligations under his own ministerial code because if it had been rejected, he would have had to resign.[43]
On 14 June 2022, Geidt appeared at a Parliamentary committee, and was widely criticised, including as the "ultimate establishment stooge... who passes for Boris Johnson’s moral guardian."[44] On 15 June 2022, Geidt resigned from the role.[45][46]The Scotsman said the reason for his resignation was that he was "tasked to offer a view about the Government's intention to consider measures which risk a deliberate and purposeful breach of the Ministerial Code".[47]The Daily Telegraph said he "had finally resigned over a row with the Prime Minister over trade policy".[48]BBC News said the resignation was due to a request for advice on a trade issue that had left him with no choice but to quit. Geidt maintained he was asked to advise this week on an issue he believed would be a deliberate breach of the ministerial code. Geidt wrote "This request has placed me in an impossible and odious position," He wrote the concept that the prime minister "might to any degree be in the business of deliberately breaching his own code is an affront" that would amount to suspending the code "to suit a political end. This would make a mockery not only of respect for the code but licence the suspension of its provisions in governing the conduct of Her Majesty's ministers. I can have no part in this."[49]
On 17 June 2022 a second letter appeared about Geidt's resignation. Geidt said he resigned due to the government's "openness" to breaking international law. Geidt maintained that statements to the effect that it was because of steel tariffs were a "distraction" and the issue was far wider. Geidt stated the steel tariffs issue was “simply one example of what might yet constitute deliberate breaches by the United Kingdom of its obligations under international law, given the government’s widely publicised openness to this”. Geidt was the second ethics adviser to resign under Johnson; Sir Alex Allan resigned in 2020.[50][51]
Geidt was appointed a Privy Counsellor (PC) in 2007.[54] He was promoted to a Life Peerage to be Baron Geidt, of Crobeg in the County of Ross and Cromarty on 3 November 2017.[30]
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