Conservative member of the Welsh Parliament Darren Millar works as a chief executive for an evangelical Christian organisation as well as his job as an MS.
In addition to his near £70,000 a year serving the people of Clwyd West, Mr Millar also works up to 20 hours a week for the Pocket Testament League. This group appears to be driven to promote their version of Christianity around the UK. Their website reads: "Only 6% of UK adults consider themselves practicing Christians. Together we’re on a mission to change this statistic, one person at a time."
Mr Millar's declaration of interest as an MS does not declare his salary from the role. His declares it in the section of "remunterated employment" and describes it as a "management role" which takes up between five - 20 hours of his time per week. It should be made clear that Mr Millar is breaking no rules.
According to the accounts filed at Companies House of Pocket Testament League, which is a charity, it has just one employee and has employment costs at £8,800 in its annual accounts up to June 30, 2021, of which £8,000 is "wages and salaries".
WalesOnline approached both the Welsh Conservatives and Darren Millar himself to ask exactly how much he was being paid for his extra curricular activities, both declined to even respond to our repeated enquires.
There has been a great deal of attention on British politicians holding second jobs after the controversy over former Tory MP Owen Paterson's lobbying for two companies. Recently WalesOnline conducted an investigation into all the Welsh MP's who have second jobs with some earning tens of thousands of pounds work for several different companies. You can read that full investigation here.
How long has Darren Millar had his second job?
Given that Mr Millar refuses to answer questions about this subject this is hard to answer. We could of course approach the Pocket Testament League directly but given that he is the only employee this seems a bit pointless. However a previous announcement by the League said that he had been in post since January 1, 2021.
Mr Millar had previously employed his wife Rebekah Millar as an research assistant and administrator on 22.2 hours a week at the public expense for 14 years but this stopped six months ago.. Since the last election he has employed the wife of Conservative MS Sam Rowlands as a case worker, also at the expense of the tax payer.
