Jill Pay

Pay replaced Major General Peter Grant Peterkin as Serjeant at Arms in 2008. She had previously worked as a business manager in the civil service. She was appointed Head Office Keeper in the House of Commons Service in 1994. She was appointed Deputy Serjeant at Arms in 2004.^[4] Before she assumed the role of Serjeant at Arms, the role of the Serjeant in the House of Commons Service had been downgraded through organisational restructuring, something with which the Queen was said to be unhappy, since the position is a Crown appointment. Jill Pay was not granted the traditional audience with the monarch.^[5]

In 2008, Pay became embroiled in political controversy when it was revealed she was the official who had consented to a police search on Damian Green's Commons office.^[2] There was some suggestion that Pay was made a scapegoat in order to protect the reputation of the then Commons Speaker Michael Martin.^[4]

Since being the Serjeant at Arms, Pay has worked with charities to promote various causes; notably, women's entrepreneurship with the Pink Shoe Club^[6] and children's literacy with Coram Beanstalk.^[7] She has recently worked on the Women and Enterprise All Party Parliamentary Group report on women's enterprise.^[8]

• Black Rod
• Serjeant at Arms of the British House of Commons