George Freeman
George Freeman has been the Conservative MP for Mid Norfolk since 2010.[1] He was appointed as parliamentary under-secretary of state at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department of Health in July 2014.[2] He was appointed government adviser on life sciences in July 2011 where he worked closely with the Department of Health and coordinated the Government’s Life Science and Innovation, Health and Wealth Strategies (2011), and the Agri-Tech Industrial Strategy (2013). Following that, he was appointed to the post of Prime Minister’s UK Trade Envoy. [3]
Party Conference 2014: Speaker at private health invitation-only event
During the Conservative Party Conference 2014, the Social Market Foundation held a late night meeting on the future of the NHS. The event was sponsored by private health company Bupa, Freeman was scheduled to speak at the invitation-only event[4]. Another speaker at the event was SMF director Nigel Keohane, who has long argued the idea of charges to see a GP and bemoaned the slow pace of NHS privatisation.[5]
External interests
After becoming a minister, Freeman quit his directorship of an agricultural seed business. Parliamentary records show that between October 2012 and March 2014 he earned £8,321,78 for 45 hours work as a non-executive director of Elsoms (Spalding) Ltd.
He believes, 'Politics needs fewer professional politicians and spin doctors, and more people who have worked in the real world. It can be a good thing when an MP can bring front-line experience as a doctor, dentist, or say, non-executive director of their family business.
'But being an MP is a full-time job so I think there should be a limit on the hours so that any outside interests have to be on top of a full-time job as MP, and should be capped at a few hours each week, and fully declared so our constituents can decide.'[6]
Notes
- ↑ George Freeman MP, House of Commons, accessed 15 July 2014.
- ↑ Ministerial appointments: July 2014, Prime Minister's Office, 15 July 2014.
- ↑ George Freeman GOV.UK, accessed 10 October 2014
- ↑ Solomon Hughes Private health lobbyists are funding a meeting with a Tory minister Vice, 27 Sep 2014, accessed 2 October 2014
- ↑ Joana Ramiro NHS activists seize Tories' Millbank HQ The People's Daily Morning Star, 30 September 2014, accessed 2 October 2014
- ↑ Annabelle Dickson Second jobs and party donations from energy firms, IT and property companies - what has your MP declared in the latest MP’s register of interests? Eastern Daily Press, 29 October 2014, accessed 20 February 2015
