Is Dominic Raab really a ‘bully’?

Who is the real victim in the Dominic Raab bullying saga? I know the story is that he was a monster in his various departments, allegedly barking instructions and wagging a finger at his stressed-out minions. But the anti-Raab revolt smacks far more of bullying to me. Civil servants clubbing together to drum an exacting minister out of his job? It definitely has a whiff of Mean Girls to it.

Raab has resigned as deputy prime minister following the findings of an investigation into his alleged bullying. In his resignation letter he says the investigation dismissed all but two of the accusations against him. The findings are ‘flawed’, he says. They potentially set a ‘dangerous precedent’. If ministers are not able to give ‘direct critical feedback’ – a euphemism for stern criticism, perhaps – they won’t be able to do their jobs properly, he said.

He has a point. None of us knows for sure what went on under Raab’s rule first in the Foreign Office and later in the justice department. It is entirely possible he sometimes crossed the line from ‘direct critical feedback’ into Malcom Tucker territory. And yet as he points out in his resignation letter, Adam Tolley, the barrister who carried out the bullying investigation, did not find any instances of him shouting or swearing or physically intimidating staff.

What is he accused of, then? One former civil servant said he could be ‘rude and aggressive’. He would ‘raise his voice’. And sometimes he engaged in ‘hard staring’ – he’d look at people with ‘cold fury’. He always expected people to turn up to meetings ‘very, very quickly’. And he expected them to ‘have the answers to all his questions’. Tolley’s investigation found Raab would sometimes bang loudly on the table and use hand gestures to indicate that ‘a person should hold off from speaking’.

Is this serious? I can see how this might make for a tense workplace, but bullying? Expecting staff to be punctual and to have the information you need to do your job is not bullying – it’s work. Raab is surely right that ‘setting the threshold for bullying so low’ – so that even looking at people ‘coldly’ or waving your hand at them is redefined as tyrannical behaviour – will make it harder for ministers to enact change and get things done.

The Guardian spoke to officials who said civil servants in Raab’s departments often felt ‘physically sick’ before meetings. That’s bad, of course. No one should feel like that at work. But what is the real problem here: Raab’s behaviour, or a new generation of mandarins who seem too fragile for the rough and tumble of political life? There have always been ministers who are severe and demanding. What’s changed, it seems to me, is the level of resilience among civil servants. It seems to have plummeted.

Surely the problem in Whitehall is less a culture of bullying than a culture of fragility. Government departments are necessarily high-pressure workplaces. They’re responsible for very serious matters indeed. Matters of life and death in the case of the Foreign Office. If ministers cannot enforce high standards and a rigorous pace for fear that some civil servants will feel wounded and offended, then we have a serious problem on our hands.

I’m worried that accusations of bullying are being used to push out ministers that the civil-servant blob disapproves of. Remember when Priti Patel was likewise accused of bullying during her time in the Home Office? Apparently she had a habit of storming out of her office and asking: ‘Why is everyone so fucking useless’. That’s not bullying. It’s a good question. Many Brits will be wondering the same about our often sclerotic civil service.

Boris Johnson stood by Patel. Raab had no such luck – he appears to have caught wind of Rishi Sunak’s plan to sack him and decided to beat him to the pass by resigning instead. He has been demonised as a tyrant, his name has been sullied, and he’s been forced out of his job for daring to have high expectations of his workforce. Sounds like bullying to me.