Senior Tory Theresa Villiers had £70k undeclared shares in Shell while environment secretary

MP was head of the environment department under Boris Johnson

Conservative former minister Theresa Villiers (Yui Mok/PA) (PA Wire)

A senior Conservative held more than £70,000 worth of undeclared shares in an oil giant while she was Environment Secretary, it has been revealed.

Theresa Villiers failed to note the shareholding on her register of interests while she held the job and only updated the transparency register more than three years later.

The MP says she "deeply regrets her failure" and told the Daily Mirror, which first reported the discrepancy, that she was not influenced by the shareholdings while she her the job.

As well as the more than £70,000 shareholding in Shell she also had holdings in drinks giant Diageo and finance firm Experian.

As environment secretary from 2019 to 2020 Ms Villiers held some of the responsibility for ensuing the UK meets it net zero emissions target.

Her register of interests, updated in July 2023, now notes that she holds the shares in Shell and has done February 2018, over a year before she was appointed as environment secretary.

A spokesperson for the MP said that she did not declare the holding because she was unaware that it would be worth over £70,000 – the threshold for members of parliament having to declare such wealth.

They also said Ms Villiers had offered to put her shareholdings into a blind trust but was told it was not necessary.

But Ellie Mae O'Hagan, head of engagement at Good Law Project, told the Mirror that the episode "raises serious questions".

“This is not just another example of the Tories ducking transparency, it also raises serious questions about whether the Government’s duty to protect our environment was completely compromised by a Secretary of State’s financial interests in big polluters in the middle of a climate emergency," she said.

It comes after Rishi Sunak said he would give the green light to over 100 new oil and gas drilling projects despite warnings by scientists that the policy is not compatible with the UK’s net zero goals.

A spokesperson for Theresa Villiers said: “Ms Villiers deeply regrets her failure to monitor the value of shareholdings and has offered her sincere apologies. These shares are part of portfolio which is professionally managed for Ms Villiers and for which she has never taken day-to-day investment decisions.

“It did not occur to her that any single shareholding would reach the threshold for declaration, but a legacy received in 2018 caused that to happen. As soon as she realised this, she alerted the Registrar of Members Interests and the Standards Commissioner. She takes full responsibility for the mistake.”

“She accepts that it should never have happened, and that she should have kept track of the additions to her investment portfolio. She is taking steps to ensure that this never happens again. Nothing she has ever said or done as MP has been influenced by these shareholdings.”

The spokesperson added: “When she was appointed as Secretary of State, Ms Villiers disclosed to Defra that she had a portfolio of shares which was professionally managed for her and over which she did not take investment decisions.

“She offered to place this in a blind trust. The Prime Minister’s ethics adviser said that this step was unnecessary because the portfolio was managed for her and she did not take investment decisions. So Ministerial Code requirements were complied with. Nothing she did as Defra Secretary was influenced by any of these shareholdings.”

Tory Treasury minister John Glen has defended a Tory MP who failed to declare she held shares valued at more than £70,000 in Shell while she was environment secretary.

Mr Glen told Sky News: “She’s admitted their mistake. I think part of the situation is there’s an MP regime for disclosures of private assets and there’s a ministerial regime.

“As I understand it, she didn’t fulfil the obligations of the MP regime while she was a minister. But as I say she’s been very clear in apologising, it was an oversight on her part, and she will correct it and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”