Sajid Javid, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

Biography

Sajid Javid MP

Sajid Javid is the new Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government following Theresa May’s appointment as Prime Minister, moving from his previous role as Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills.

Javid has been the MP for Bromsgrove since 2010, and has served a number of ministerial roles prior to his most recent appointment. Previous political appointments include acting as Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport from 2014 to 2015, Minister for Equalities in 2014, Financial Secretary to the Treasury from 2013 to 2014 and Economic Secretary from 2012 to 2013. Javid was also one of the first MPs from the 2010 intake to be made a Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) when he was appointed PPS to John Hayes, then Minister of State for Further Education in 2010.

In June 2016 Javid announced that he will be running on a joint ticket for the Conservative leadership alongside Stephen Crabb following the resignation of David Cameron. This joint ticket would have had Javid becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer in the event that Stephen Crabb won the leadership ballot. Crabb and Javid withdrew from the contest after the first round of voting after they finished fourth out of five candidates and Javid subsequently announced that he will be backing Theresa May.

Before public service, he was a senior managing director with Deutsche Bank AG, having started his career with Chase Manhattan Bank NA in New York in 1991. While at Deutsche Bank Sajid was a specialist in helping to raise investment in developing countries.

Analysis

In his new role, Javid will now be responsible for the overall strategic direction of the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), taking over from Greg Clark who was appointed to the role last year. It will be intriguing to watch the relationship between Javid and May develop over the coming months. They previously clashed on plans by Theresa May to give Ofcom “counter-extremism powers” to vet British television programmes before they were broadcast, which Javid opposed, quite publicly.

Upon his appointment to Secretary of State for Culture, David Cameron is to have said that Javid was the “most robust right-winger in the cabinet” and it will be interesting to see how he approaches the issues within his new remit within his first few months. The replacement of Greg Clark raised some eyebrows given how well-liked he was amongst a number of local councils and stakeholders due to his determination to push through the devolution programme. However, Javid will be keen to demonstrate he is still the decisive politician he was once thought of circa the Tata Steel incident and will no-doubt wish to push the devolution agenda in the same manner to which his predecessor did and to which councils have become accustomed.

The Communities Secretary has already had a chance to put forward his views at the dispatch box. However, with Labour MPs failing to fill the opposition seats we did not learn a great deal, aside from the fact that there will supposedly be no dilution whatever to the protections of the green belt.