Shameless Theresa May today showers her cronies with gongs - despite vowing to overhaul the system after David Cameron rewarded allies.
Former Prime Minister Mrs May has doled out 41 accolades including knighthoods, peerages and OBEs to loyalists who propped her up in power or were with her in the Downing Street bunker in the dying days of her premiership.
They include Brexit bunglers blamed for the crisis gripping the country after she was unable to force her withdrawal deal through Parliament.
Just two years ago in the Tory election manifesto, the then Conservative leader pledged: “We will review the honours system to make sure it commands public confidence, rewards genuine public service and that recipients uphold the integrity of the honours bestowed.”
That vow came after widespread outrage at Mr Cameron’s decision to honour a host of flunkies from his six years in No10.
However, six weeks after skulking out of Downing Street to make way for Boris Johnson , Mrs May exploited the system to recognise the loyalty and devotion of her own officials.
Awards include a peerage for chief of staff Gavin Barwell - a former Tory MP booted out by voters in her 2017 election disaster; a Companion of Honour for former party chairman Sir Patrick McLoughlin; and a knighthood for her Commons bag carrier, parliamentary private secretary George Hollingbery.
Her former joint chiefs of staff Fiona Hill and Nick Timothy - dubbed the “terror twins” in Whitehall for their fierce protection of their boss - receive CBEs.
Also gaining the honour are Chief Whip Julian Smith, who oversaw the biggest ever Commons defeat for a Government when MPs rejected Mrs May’s Brexit deal, former party chairman Brandon Lewis and the Tories’ acting Scottish leader Jackson Carlaw.
Mrs May’s election agent in her Maidenhead constituency, Philip Dumville, becomes an OBE.
In a two-fingered salute to Tory Brexiteers who ousted her, she also knighted her chief Brexit negotiator Olly Robbins - the civil servant behind her doomed EU withdrawal agreement.
And in another rebuke to hardliners in her own party, Sir Kim Darroch, the UK’s ambassador to the US, is given a peerage.
New PM Mr Johnson refused to back Sir Kim in a row with Donald Trump after leaked e-mails showed the British envoy branded the President’s White House administration “clumsy and inept”.
And in a thinly-veiled slap down to Jeremy Corbyn , the former PM hands a peerage to outgoing Labour MP John Mann, a Brexiteer who has been a thorn in the Labour leader’s side.
Mrs May had already appointed Mr Mann the Government’s anti-Semitism tsar and earlier this week he announced he was quitting the Commons at the next election.
Mrs May, who was in No10 from July 2016 to July 2019, also honoured Chequers head chef Graham Howarth, responsible for preparing meals at the PM’s 16th Century country retreat in Bucks, and No10 housekeeper Debra Wheatley.
Britain’s top police officer, Met Commissioner Cressida Dick, becomes a Dame.
Her male predecessors as heads of the country’s biggest force were Sirs.
Opposition parties also seized the chance to send loyalists to the House of Lords.
Labour leader Mr Corbyn appointed former National Union of Teachers’ chief Christine Blower to the Upper Chamber, while the Greens created their second peer, sending former leader Natalie Bennett to the Lords.
Peers can trouser £305 a day just for turning up.
