Brown completes government of 'all talents' with team of outsiders

Gordon Brown has appointed Admiral Sir Alan West, the former head of the Royal Navy, as a security minister at the Home Office as he appointed a string of "outsiders" to his government team. Sir Alan, a Falklands hero who has criticised defence cuts, is former chief of defence intelligence and deputy chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee. He is among five new ministers who were not members of the Labour Party appointed by the Prime Minister.

But his appointment was delayed and overshadowed by the discovery of a car laden with petrol, gas and nails in London's West End. The Cabinet was briefed on the bomb plot by Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary.

Related articles

• Richard Ingrams' Week: Restore trust? It was never there to begin with
• Leading article: A bomb, a war and a government signalling a change of course
• Andrew Grice: The Week In Politics
• Deborah Orr: These aren't real business leaders. They're just masters of self-promotion
• MP accused of attempted coup against Blair goes to whips' office
• Howard Jacobson: Not waving but scowling: in praise of Gordon Brown's reign of the repressed
• Search the news archive for more stories

Downing Street said the appointment of outsiders fulfilled Mr Brown's promise to appoint a government of "all the talents". But Labour MPs angrily protested that they should join the party.

New ministers include Professor Sir Ara Darzi, who becomes a health minister in the Lords. He is a consultant surgeon and expert in the use of robotics, and has an international private practice. He will work Monday to Thursday as a minister - being paid for three days - and continue to work as an NHS surgeon, unpaid, on Fridays. Any income from his international private practice will be paid direct to Imperial College to fund research, the Prime Minister's spokesman said.

Shriti Vadera, Mr Brown's progress-chaser at the Treasury, becomes Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for International Development after 14 years at the investment bank UBS Warburg.

Sir Digby Jones, the former director general of the CBI, becomes minister of state for trade and investment in the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

Asked last night whether he was a socialist, Sir Digby said: "No I'm not. I am delighted to put business and wealth creation right in the middle of the Government. I am taking the Labour whip. You do what the captain says. That is what I will do."

Sir Mark Malloch Brown, former UN deputy general secretary, who becomes a Foreign Office minister, is the fifth outsider to join the Government.

Officials said the five would be expected to take the Labour whip in the Lords, but do not have to join the Labour Party. "The decision as to whether or not they join the Labour Party is a personal decision," said the spokesman. "As ministers, they are expected to take the Government whip."

The former head of the Metropolitan Police, Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, was appointed to be the Prime Minister's senior adviser on international security issues. He is understood to have turned down an offer to be made a full-time minister and is also an adviser to the Tory Party on border controls.

Baroness Neuberger, a Liberal Democrat, will champion volunteering. The Liberal Democrat civil liberties lawyer, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, agreed to advise on constitutional reform.

The Cabinet agreed a plan for constitutional changes, including a change in the law to require a vote in Parliament before Britain can go to war. Cabinet meetings will be held on Tuesday mornings, not Thursdays, to give ministers more time for discussion.

* Labour has opened a four-point lead over the Tories, according to the first opinion poll since Mr Brown became Prime Minister. The ICM survey for today's Guardian shows Labour on 39 per cent, the Tories on 35 per cent and the Liberal Democrats on 18 per cent.

The new talent

Sir Digby Jones

Age: 51

Career: Former director general of Confederation of British Industry who has worked as a skills envoy for Mr Brown. Eurosceptic who once branded union leaders "increasingly irrelevant". Knighted in 2005.

New role: To beat the drum for British business abroad. Appointment as life peer completes remarkable journey from corporate lawyer to bosses' spokesman to Labour's trade minister. He will not, however, become a formal party member.

Lord Lester of Herne Hill

Age: 71

Career: Liberal Democrat peer and leading human rights lawyer. Adviser to former Labour home secretary Roy Jenkins in the 1970s. Founder member, SDP, 1981.

New role: To advise Jack Straw, Secretary of State for Justice, on constitutional reform.

Baroness Neuberger

Age: 57

Career: Liberal Democrat peer and former chief executive of the King's Fund. A high-profile liberal rabbi who appears regularly on BBC Radio 4's Thought for the Day slot.

New role: To advise Gordon Brown on the voluntary sector.

Admiral Sir Alan West

Age: 60

Career: Formerly First Sea Lord and head of the Royal Navy at time of Iraq invasion (about which he harboured strong concerns). Served in Falklands War; awarded DSC for leadership.

New role: Minister for Security at the Home Office.

Shriti Vadera

Age: 44

Career: As economic adviser to Gordon Brown, she has been main point of contact between Treasury and City. Tipped as a future Governor of the Bank of England.

New role: Junior minister at Department for International Development.