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Sue Gray: Top NI civil servant moves back to Westminster

BBC Sue Gray giving evidence at a house of commons committeeBBC
Sue Gray became permanent secretary at the Department of Finance in 2018

Stormont's top civil servant in the Department of Finance is to move back to a job in Westminster.

Sue Gray became permanent secretary at the Department of Finance in May 2018.

Prior to that, she had been working as a senior civil servant in Whitehall for a number of years.

The government has confirmed she has taken up a role as the new second permanent secretary in the Cabinet Office.

'Big challenges ahead'

It said she will take up her role later this month and will lead on the union and the constitution.

As director general of the Propriety and Ethics Team in the cabinet, Ms Gray ran the investigation which led to the resignation of the prime minister's deputy, Damien Green, and had a pivotal role in cabinet reshuffles.

In a tweet announcing her departure from Stormont on Thursday, Ms Gray posted: "Chuffed to be appointed to a new Permanent Secretary role within @cabinetofficeuk."

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Ms Gray was among several candidates in the running for the head of the civil service job in NI last year, but the first and deputy first ministers failed to agree an appointee.

That recruitment process is currently under way again.

In the 1980s, she ran the Cove Bar outside Newry with her husband Bill Conlon, a well known country and western singer from the Ards Peninsula in County Down.