BETA filters Key Facts (2) Rishi Sunak (3) Rishi Sunak met with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for talks at the UN Climate Summit Cop27 in Egypt. As PA Media reports, the couple smiled and thanked the media at the start of the meeting. Afterwards, Von der Leyen said she was looking forward to a “constructive” relationship. Good first meeting with PM @RishiSunak on the sidelines of #COP27 We face many common challenges, from tackling climate change and the energy transition to Russia’s war on Ukraine. I look forward to a constructive 🇪🇺🇬🇧 cooperation based on our agreements. pic.twitter.com/TeInbLKVSn — Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) November 7, 2022
Shapps says Home Office ‘risked’ breaching Manston conditionalities law when replacing Suella Braverman as home secretary
Grant Shapps, the business secretary, said the Home Office was “at risk” of breaking the law because of conditions at the Manston processing center for asylum seekers when he was appointed to replace Suella Braverman as home secretary. Braverman has been heavily criticized for allowing the camp to become overcrowded. He was accused of ignoring legal advice which said it would be illegal for migrants to be held in the camp for more than 24 hours and of refusing to give them extra hotel accommodation. She denied both of these allegations. However, insiders claim that conditions began to improve when Shapps became interior minister. In an interview with Sky News, when asked why he wanted to take people to hotels, Shapps said: It’s just that we have to be careful not to break the law ourselves by detaining people who can be outside of it – well, it’s not a detention center, it’s a processing center in Manston. So it’s really just a matter of making sure we were acting within the law. This is something the Home Secretary is continuing to do now. Asked if this meant the Home Office was breaking the law under Braverman’s policies, Shapps said: The advice I had was very clear – that we risked doing this if we didn’t act. I played a role for six days at work. Shapps was interior secretary for less than a week and was replaced by Braverman. With media attention now focused on the overcrowding scandal at Manston, the Home Office has now reduced the numbers at the camp. Grant Shapps on Sky News. Photo: Sky News Updated at 10:40 GMT In his Q&A at the Cop27 summit, Boris Johnson, the former prime minister, said the world was failing to honor the net zero promises made at Cop26 in Glasgow. My colleague Bibi van der Zee has full coverage on the Cop27 live blog. In his interview with the Sun on his flight to Egypt, Rishi Sunak reiterated his opposition to I’m a Celebrity contestant Matt Hancock. “I was very disappointed,” Sunak told the paper, saying MPs should work for their constituents. Sunak was also asked about the rather more consequential issue of what will happen in next week’s Autumn Statement, but the headline in the draft of his answer – “I’ll be Santa, not Scrooge for Britain, vows Rishi Sunak” – may prove to be the least accurate thing ever written about what will actually be another colossal budget. It was prompted by Sunak’s evasive response to a question about whether the budget would make him Santa Claus or Scrooge. The exact answer, of course, is none – because even Scrooge has never imposed fiscal tightening on the scale predicted for next week. As my colleague Jessica Elgot reports, the latest is that it will include tax rises and spending cuts totaling £60bn, including cuts of at least £35bn. At one point, government sources indicated that spending cuts would account for 50 percent of the savings, with tax increases delivering the other 50 percent, but it now appears that spending cuts will account for a larger share of the savings than originally planned. However, the new figures will still make Jeremy Hunt, the current chancellor, more of a taxpayer than George Osborne. When Osborne became chancellor in 2010, his austerity program was 80% cuts and just 20% tax rises. Updated at 10.05 GMT Rishi Sunak with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan of the United Arab Emirates at Cop27 this morning. Photo: Reuters Updated at 10.05 GMT Grant Shapps, the business secretary, was the No 10 voice on the airwaves this morning. In an interview with Sky News, he said that Gavin Williamson should not have sent offensive messages to Wendy Morton. Sapps said: I don’t think it was right to send such messages. I see they must have been sent in a moment of frustration. I think, in general, it’s much better to write things you wouldn’t live to regret later. And especially with colleagues, writing things politely, even if you have an opinion to express, I think is not unreasonable. So, I don’t think he was right to send them. The prime minister said the same. I know the party is going through a process looking at them right now. My colleague Peter Walker has the full story here. Updated at 10.05 GMT Rishi Sunak arrives in Sharm El Sheikh last night for the Cop27 summit. Photo: WPA/Getty Images
Rishi Sunak is under fresh pressure over Gavin Williamson as new allegation emerges
Good morning. Rishi Sunak is in Egypt, attending the Cop27 climate summit, on his first visit abroad as prime minister. And, like all Prime Ministers, he learns that while you can take the Prime Minister out of Westminster, you can never leave him behind, because the domestic political hassle keeps plugging your coffers, even on the day you want them. to focus on international issues and engage with world leaders. One such problem for Sunak is Gavin Williamson. On Friday and over the weekend it emerged that Sunak had appointed Williamson as a Cabinet minister, with the right to attend cabinet, even though the Conservative party is considering a complaint about him by Wendy Morton. She says he sent her abusive, threatening messages when he was chief whip because he was angry at not being invited to the Queen’s funeral. While flying to Egypt for the summit, Sunak told the Sun in an interview that the messages from Williamson were “unacceptable”. He said: They were not acceptable or correct. It was a difficult time for our party at that time, but regardless, people should always be treated with respect. I’m glad Gavin expressed his regret. There is an independent complaints process running, it is only right and reasonable that we allow it to complete. Sunak says he didn’t read Williamson’s messages until yesterday. But he has not denied that he was aware of them when he appointed Williamson to his government. (No one seems sure what Williamson is doing as a minister without portfolio in the Cabinet Office, and the appointment looked like it had more to do with rewarding a powerful supporter than boosting government performance.) Some would argue that if the messages were unacceptable, having Williamson in government should not be acceptable either. That’s not Sunak’s position at the moment, but this morning the Times made it harder for Sunak to keep Williamson by reporting a new allegation about Williamson’s behavior when he was chief whip. In their story, Stephen Swinford and Gabriel Pogrud say a minister (whom they did not name) claimed that “Williamson brought up details of her private life during a conversation in an attempt to silence her while she was on the back benches.” Swinford and Pogrund report: The Tory MP, who told the Conservative party at the weekend she was willing to discuss the matter, said Williamson had invited her to his office when he was chief whip in 2016. At the time he was campaigning on an issue that was causing difficulty for the government. During the meeting, Williamson is said to have raised a sensitive topic about her private life, which she interpreted as an implied threat. Allies of Williamson denied he was trying to silence the MP and said he raised the issue in a “pastoral capacity”. We’re likely to hear more about this as the day goes on. My colleague Bibi van der Zee will be covering Cop27 in a separate live blog. I’ll be covering some of the UK line from Cop27 here, but I’ll be focusing heavily on non-police issues. Here is the agenda for the day. 8.10 am (UK time): Rishi Sunak is due to hold a bilateral meeting with Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, at the Cop27 summit in Egypt. He also has bilateral meetings scheduled with Giorgia Meloni, the new Italian prime minister, at 9.15am. and with Emmanuel Macron, the French president, at 14:00. 8.45am: Boris Johnson, the former prime minister, is due to speak at a New York Times event at Cop27. 11.30am: Sunak speaks at a roundtable event at Cop27. He is also scheduled to take part in an evening event. Morning: Keir Starmer visits Labour’s Green Prosperity Agenda this morning. 2pm: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, speaks at a Cop27 event. 2.30pm: Ben Wallace, the Defense Secretary, takes questions in the Commons. 4pm: James Bowler, the new permanent secretary at the Treasury, gives evidence to the Commons public accounts committee on the creation of the UK infrastructure bank. I’m trying to follow the comments below the line (BTL) but it’s impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, include “Andrew” somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I try to answer questions and if they’re of general interest I’ll post the question and answer above the line (ATL), though I can’t promise I’ll do it for everyone. If you want to get my attention quickly, it’s probably best to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow. Alternatively you can email me at [email protected] Updated on…
