The UK minister who awarded a multi-million-dollar contract to a ferry company with no ships is back with a lucrative ports job.
Former transport secretary Chris Grayling has landed a £100,000 ($130,000)-per-year position as an advisor to Hutchison Ports, which operates Harwich and Felixstowe in eastern England, among other terminals.
The BBC cited the parliamentary register of MPs' interests as revealing he will be paid for seven hours' work per week over the next year.
The Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (ACOBA) said Grayling had reassured it that he would not be advising the company on its commercial maritime activities or risks and opportunities associated with Brexit.
His role will be limited to advice on environmental strategy and work with local enterprise bodies.
Grayling, who quit as transport secretary when Boris Johnson became prime minister in July 2019, is best known for handing a £13.8m deal to Seaborne Freight to run ferry routes post-Brexit.
The company had no ships and later pulled out of the contract.
The government also ended up paying out £51m to compensate DFDS and Brittany Ferries after it tore up their contracts for routes offering an alternative to Dover.
The UK then had to settle a court case with Eurotunnel for £34m over the lack of a public tender for the deals.
'No laughing matter'
This is in turn prompted legal action from P&O Ferries, which had also been left out in the cold.
Transport union RMT's leader Mick Cash said: "When I was first told that Chris Grayling had been appointed to this lucrative part-time post, I assumed it was a wind-up.
"Now it's been confirmed as true, some may think it's a sick joke, but it's no laughing matter for the ports and ferries staff facing a post-Covid jobs massacre."
Johnson tried to install Grayling as chair of the House of Commons Intelligence and Security Committee in July, but other members backed colleague Julian Lewis instead.
