Evening summary
Here is a round-up of the day’s main headlines:
The deadline for the Cabinet Office to hand over Boris Johnson’s WhatsApp messages, diaries and personal notebooks to the Covid public inquiry has expired. If the government has failed to comply with the order of the inquiry’s chair, Heather Hallett, to disclose the documents, it could lead to a court battle and possibly a criminal offence. Ministers could seek a judicial review of her order as the government has argued it should not have to disclose material that is “unambiguously irrelevant” to the inquiry, PA reported.
Rishi Sunak has said the government is “carefully considering next steps” in the row over whether to disclose Boris Johnson’s private messages and papers to the Covid public inquiry. Speaking to broadcasters at a gathering of European leaders in Moldova, the prime minister said: “I think it’s really important that we learn the lessons of Covid so that we can be better prepared in the future. We’re doing that in the spirit of rigour, but also transparency and candour. We’ve cooperated – the government’s cooperated thoroughly with the inquiry to date, handing over tens of thousands of documents, and we will continue to comply, of course, with the law, cooperate with the inquiry. We’re confident in our position but are carefully considering next steps.”
A Savanta poll released this morning found that 61% of Britons think Johnson’s unredacted diary entries and WhatsApp messages should be handed over to the Covid inquiry. The poll came as No 10 faced calls to hand over evidence without redactions to the Covid inquiry. On Wednesday, it was reported that Johnson handed over a major cache of WhatsApp messages and notebooks to the Cabinet Office.
The Covid inquiry must take an unflinching look at how the UK’s lack of decent sick pay left the country “brutally exposed” during the pandemic, the TUC has said. The UK entered the pandemic with the lowest rate of statutory sick pay in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (an intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries) and with millions unable to access it, the union body claimed.
A long-serving MP has had the Labour whip suspended after allegations of sexual harassment surfaced from five women stretching back over several years. Geraint Davies, who represents Swansea West in the House of Commons, is facing an investigation after the claims were made by anonymous alleged victims to the Politico website. No formal complaints have been made about Davies, due to those who were allegedly targeted being said to have a lack of confidence that they would be taken seriously.
But Sky News reports that Labour whips were informed of allegations against Davies “many months ago”. Liz Bates, a political correspondent for the news broadcaster, said: “Sky News has seen evidence today that the Labour whips’ office was made aware of the allegations against the veteran MP many months ago.”
Public spending on the asylum system has quadrupled under Conservative-led governments, according to official figures, as Rishi Sunak prepares to discuss ways of reducing the number of people seeking asylum with other European leaders. Labour has unearthed figures that show the amount spent on the asylum system has increased from £550m in 2012 to £2.1bn in 2021. There was a further substantial increase in 2022, as slower asylum decisions and Suella Braverman’s last-minute decision-making led to an increase in costly hotel use, the party has claimed.
Calls by senior Tories to abolish inheritance tax have been met with scepticism from senior economists and tax experts. More than 50 Conservative MPs, including the former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi, have urged Rishi Sunak and the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, to scrap the tax, according to the Telegraph. But Paul Johnson, the head of the independent economic thinktank the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said the tax should instead be overhauled, as it tends to be easier to avoid for the very rich with broadly based wealth than for those with only one asset.
Brexit will be remembered as a “historic economic error” that damaged the UK economy and has helped to drive inflation higher, according to the former US treasury secretary Larry Summers. Singling out Britain’s departure from the EU as a factor for higher costs, Summers also criticised the UK’s economic policy as “substantially flawed for some years”.
Ukraine has placed sanctions on Alexander Lebedev, the Russian oligarch who hosted Boris Johnson at lavish parties in London and Italy, Tortoise reports. Lebedev bought the Evening Standard and the Independent newspapers about a decade ago. Under Johnson, Lebedev’s son, Evgeny Lebedev, was given a seat in the House of Lord’s despite security warnings from MI5.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the UK politics live blog for today. Thanks for following along.
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Deadline for the Cabinet Office to hand over Boris Johnson documents passes
The deadline for the Cabinet Office to hand over Boris Johnson’s WhatsApp messages, diaries and personal notebooks to the Covid public inquiry has expired.
If the government has failed to comply with the order of the inquiry chair, Heather Hallett, to disclose the documents, it could lead to a court battle and possibly a criminal offence.
Ministers could seek a judicial review of her order as the government has argued it should not have to disclose material that is “unambiguously irrelevant” to the inquiry, PA reported.
Just 45 minutes before the 4pm deadline, Rishi Sunak told broadcasters the government was still considering its next steps.
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Rishi Sunak says government is 'confident' in position on Covid inquiry as deadline looms
Rishi Sunak has said the government is “carefully considering next steps” in the row over whether to disclose Boris Johnson’s private messages and papers to the Covid public inquiry.
Speaking to broadcasters at a gathering of European leaders in Moldova, the prime minister said:
I think it’s really important that we learn the lessons of Covid so that we can be better prepared in the future.
We’re doing that in the spirit of rigour but also transparency and candour. We’ve cooperated – the government’s cooperated thoroughly with the inquiry to date, handing over tens of thousands of documents, and we will continue to comply, of course, with the law, cooperate with the inquiry.
We’re confident in our position but are carefully considering next steps.
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Calls by senior Tories to abolish inheritance tax (IHT) have been met with scepticism from senior economists and tax experts.
More than 50 Conservative MPs, including former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi, have urged prime minister Rishi Sunak and chancellor Jeremy Hunt to scrap the tax, according to the Telegraph.
But Paul Johnson, head of the independent economic thinktank the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said the tax should instead be overhauled, as it tends to be easier to avoid for the very rich with broadly based wealth than for those with only one asset.
He tweeted:
Rather than scrapping IHT we urgently need to reform it. It is genuinely unfair.
The very wealthy pay an average rate half, or less, that paid by the moderately wealthy. If all you leave is the family house it’s hard to avoid. If you have millions it is absurdly easy to avoid.
Inheritance tax is paid when a person’s estate is worth more than £325,000 when they die, and they do not leave everything above the threshold to their spouse, civil partner, a charity or a community amateur sports club.
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Deadline for Cabinet Office to hand over Johnson papers one hour away
The deadline for the government to hand over Boris Johnson’s unredacted WhatsApp messages to the Covid inquiry is now just one hour away.
Johnson handed over a trove of documents – including notebooks and WhatsApp messages – on Wednesday. His team say the Cabinet Office did have access to the details for months and had been invited to view them on multiple occasions at his office.
But the move poses a serious headache for the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, given the government may be forced to take legal action if it wants to avoid handing over the information.
Earlier today Grant Shapps, the energy secretary, said there was “nothing to be shy or embarrassed about” for ministers who were trying their best to grapple with the first pandemic in a century.
As the 4pm deadline for the Cabinet Office to hand over the files loomed, he called for the inquiry to be given “whatever they want”.
“There are things which we did that were very good,” Shapps told TalkTV. “Things will have gone wrong, naturally. The inquiry is there to get to the bottom of all of that.”
Rishi Sunak said he is making cooperation on addressing illegal migration a priority at a meeting of the European Political Community.
The prime minister tweeted:
I’m meeting European leaders in Moldova today, putting tackling illegal migration top of the international agenda.
We’ve already made migration agreements with Albania, France and the EU to stop the boats.
This global issue requires collaboration and the UK is taking the lead.
I’m meeting European leaders in Moldova today, putting tackling illegal migration top of the international agenda.
— Rishi Sunak (@RishiSunak) June 1, 2023
We've already made migration agreements with Albania, France and the EU to stop the boats.
This global issue requires collaboration and the UK is taking the lead. pic.twitter.com/LoYkdTSREP
Labour whips 'informed of allegations against Geraint Davies months ago', reports Sky News
Sky News reports that Labour whips were informed of allegations against Geraint Davies “many months ago”.
Liz Bates, a political correspondent for the news broadcaster, said: “Sky News has seen evidence today that the Labour whips’ office was made aware of the allegations against the veteran MP many months ago.”
Earlier this morning, Stephen Kinnock, the shadow immigration minister, told Times Radio that Labour’s whips were “very alive” to the issue of sexual misconduct in Westminster.
Kinnock said: “The key thing is that, when something like this happens, a formal complaint must be made. And I do genuinely believe that our whips and our party is very alive to this issue.”
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Ukraine has placed sanctions on Alexander Lebedev, the Russian oligarch who hosted Boris Johnson at lavish parties in London and Italy, Tortoise reports.
Lebedev bought the Evening Standard and the Independent newspapers about a decade ago. Under Johnson, Lebedev’s son, Evgeny Lebedev, was given a seat in the House of Lord’s despite security warnings from MI5.
Lebedev was placed under sanctions in October last year but this has not previously been reported. The sanctions block Lebedev from moving funds out of Ukraine and from making financial transactions within the country.
The UK government has not placed sanctions on Lebedev. Last May, when it was reported that Canada had done so, Labour’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner, called on the Russian oligarch to face sanctions in the UK.
“Labour has been clear that anyone with links to the KGB [now the FSB] must face sanctions. The Conservatives have been so slow and too soft in issuing sanctions to those with links to Putin,” Rayner said.
“There is now an extremely strong case for Alexander Lebedev to face sanctions from the UK, and the government must now urgently look at the evidence.”
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A Savanta poll released this morning found that 61% of Britons think Boris Johnson’s unredacted diary entries and WhatsApp messages should be handed over to the Covid inquiry.
The poll comes as No 10 faces calls to hand over evidence without redactions to the Covid inquiry. On Wednesday, it was reported that Boris Johnson handed over a major cache of WhatsApp messages and notebooks to the Cabinet Office.
The poll also found that 71% of Britons say it is likely that Rishi Sunak would have known if Johnson had broken further lockdown restrictions.
Forty-four per cent of respondents said Partygate matters just as much now as it did when Johnson was PM; 26% said it matters more and 25% said it matters less.
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Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, and Britain’s prime minister, Rishi Sunak, greet each other at a welcome ceremony during a meeting of the European Political Community at Mimi Castle in Bulboaca, Moldova.
Updated
Brexit will be remembered as a “historic economic error” that damaged the UK economy and has helped to drive inflation higher, according to the former US treasury secretary Larry Summers.
Singling out Britain’s departure from the EU as a factor for higher costs, Summers also criticised the UK’s economic policy as “substantially flawed for some years”.
Brexit “reduced the competitiveness of the UK economy, put downwards pressure on the pound and upwards pressure on prices, limited imports of goods and limited in some ways the supply of labour”, Summers told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“All of which contributed to higher inflation,” he added.
Official figures last week showed inflation remained stubbornly high, at 8.7%, in the UK as households come under pressure from the fastest annual rise in food prices since the late 1970s. US consumer prices have been slowing in recent months, dropping to an annual inflation rate of 4.9% in April.
Updated
Public spending on the asylum system has quadrupled under Conservative-led governments, according to official figures, as Rishi Sunak prepares to discuss ways of reducing the number of people seeking asylum with other European leaders.
Labour has unearthed figures that show the amount spent on the asylum system has increased from £550m in 2012 to £2.1bn in 2021.
There was a further substantial increase in 2022, as slower asylum decisions and Suella Braverman’s last-minute decision-making led to an increase in costly hotel use, the party has claimed.
Asylum spending figures taken from the first financial year of the Tory-led coalition government in 2010 showed that £567,856,116 was spent processing asylum claims and on accommodation. By 2021-22 that had risen to £2,115,584,829.
It is expected to increase further when the figures for 2022-23 are published, as recent estimates show that an additional £2.4bn from the overseas aid budget was used to support the asylum system on top of normal costs.
Last week, the government announced that the asylum backlog had reached a new record high of 173,000.
The Covid inquiry must take an unflinching look at how the UK’s lack of decent sick pay left the country “brutally exposed” during the pandemic, the TUC has said.
The UK entered the pandemic with the lowest rate of statutory sick pay (SSP) in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, an intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries, and with millions unable to access it, the union body claimed.
This “broken sick pay system” massively undermined the country’s preparedness and ability to deal with the pandemic, and resulted in millions facing a huge financial cliff edge if they contracted Covid, it added.
The inquiry will take witness evidence from Tuesday 13 June.
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A long-serving MP has had the Labour whip suspended after allegations of sexual harassment surfaced from five women stretching back over several years.
Geraint Davies, who represents Swansea West in the House of Commons, is facing an investigation after the claims made by anonymous alleged victims to the Politico website.
No formal complaints have been made about Davies, due to those who were allegedly targeted being said to have a lack of confidence that they would be taken seriously.
Labour described the claims of “completely unacceptable behaviour” as “incredibly serious” and said it strongly encouraged anyone who wanted to make a formal complaint to come forward.
“Any complainant will have access to an independent support service who provide confidential and independent guidance and advice from external experts throughout the process,” a spokesperson for the party added.
Davies has been contacted for comment but is quoted by Politico as saying: “I don’t recognise the allegations suggested and do not know who has made them.
“None of them, as far as I know, has been lodged as complaints with the Labour party or parliament. If I have inadvertently caused offence to anyone, then I am naturally sorry as it is important that we share an environment of mutual and equal respect for all.”
Davies has been an MP for decades, first in Croydon Central from 1997 to 2005, until he lost his seat, and then again in Swansea West since 2010.
Shadow immigration minister Stephen Kinnock said Labour’s whips were “very alive” to the issue of sexual misconduct in Westminster.
It comes as a Labour MP, Geraint Davies, had the whip suspended after allegations of sexual harassment surfaced from five women stretching back over several years.
Kinnock told Times Radio:
The key thing is that, when something like this happens, a formal complaint must be made. And I do genuinely believe that our whips and our party is very alive to this issue.
People get suspended, they lose the whip, investigations take place.
I think we need to make that happen as rapidly and effectively as possible and make sure that anyone who does feel that they have a complaint to make that they know that they can do so in confidence, and that they will be treated with respect and confidentiality and with action will be taken.
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A cabinet minister has piled pressure on the government to hand over Boris Johnson’s unredacted WhatsApp messages to the Covid inquiry, saying it should be allowed to “get on with its job”.
Grant Shapps, the energy secretary, said there was “nothing to be shy or embarrassed about” for ministers who were trying their best to grapple with the first pandemic in a century.
As the 4pm deadline for the Cabinet Office to hand over the files loomed, he called for the inquiry to be given “whatever they want”.
“There are things which we did that were very good,” Shapps told TalkTV. “Things will have gone wrong, naturally. The inquiry is there to get to the bottom of all of that.”
Johnson handed over a trove of documents – including notebooks and WhatsApp messages – on Wednesday. His team say the Cabinet Office did have access to the details for months and had been invited to view them on multiple occasions at his office.
But the move poses a serious headache for prime minister, Rishi Sunak, given the government may be forced to take legal action if it wants to avoid handing over the information.
The case is viewed as a litmus test, and senior government figures fear if they acquiesce then more requests could be made for workbooks and WhatsApps from ministers who are still serving.
Lord Saville, who conducted the inquiry into Bloody Sunday, said Covid inquiry chair Heather Hallett was best placed to decide what information was relevant to her review into the pandemic.
The crossbench peer’s comments come as the government faces a deadline to release former prime minister Boris Johnson’s unredacted messages and diaries to the Covid inquiry or potentially face a legal dispute.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Saville said:
Who is to decide what is relevant or not? In my view, prima facie at least, it is Lady Hallett.
She is in charge of the inquiry, one of her duties is to do a thorough job. It is for her to decide whether something is relevant or not. If she looks at something and decides it is not relevant then there is no reason to publish it.
When it was put to him that some of the messages shared with Johnson could reveal private information that is not relevant to the inquiry, he replied:
It may be, but if you are going to show it to somebody like Lady Hallett, I can’t think of anyone better placed to be able to form a judgment and I can’t see any downside of her, as a very senior and respected judge, seeing material that would otherwise be private.
During his inquiry into what happened on Bloody Sunday, Saville said he did not face obstacles to obtaining information from the UK government but there had been a request that some of it be kept secret from the public for “security reasons”.
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Labour suspends MP over 'incredibly serious allegations'
Labour has suspended MP Geraint Davies pending an investigation into reports of “incredibly serious allegations of completely unacceptable behaviour”.
The decision to administratively suspend the Swansea West MP means he will have the whip removed in Westminster while a review is carried out.
It follows claims against the veteran politician, which were reported by the website Politico.
A Labour spokesperson said:
These are incredibly serious allegations of completely unacceptable behaviour.
We strongly encourage anyone with a complaint to come forward to the Labour party’s investigation.
Any complainant will have access to an independent support service who provide confidential and independent guidance and advice from external experts throughout the process.
Deadline looms for Cabinet Office to hand over Johnson papers
Good morning and welcome to the UK politics live blog. We begin with news that Rishi Sunak’s government could face a legal battle with the Covid public inquiry unless it backs down over a demand to disclose Boris Johnson’s private messages and papers.
The Cabinet Office has been given until 4pm today to hand over diaries, notebooks and a trove of WhatsApp messages or face the threat of a criminal prosecution, PA reported.
The government had argued that it did not have the messages and notebooks, but Johnson has handed them over to officials and said they should be disclosed – putting the Cabinet Office in a difficult position.
The Cabinet Office has also argued that it should withhold “unambiguously irrelevant” material, but the inquiry chair, Heather Hallett, has ruled that everything should be disclosed and she will decide what is or is not necessary for her work.
Johnson’s decision to publicly confirm he has handed over the material – stripping the Cabinet Office of one of its defences – and his suggestion that it should be disclosed to the inquiry has heaped pressure on his successor’s government.
Johnson’s spokesperson said on Wednesday:
All Boris Johnson’s material – including WhatsApps and notebooks – requested by the Covid inquiry has been handed to the Cabinet Office in full and in unredacted form.
Mr Johnson urges the Cabinet Office to urgently disclose it to the inquiry. The Cabinet Office has had access to this material for several months. Mr Johnson would immediately disclose it directly to the inquiry if asked.
While Mr Johnson understands the government’s position, and does not seek to contradict it, he is perfectly happy for the inquiry to have access to this material in whatever form it requires.
More on this throughout the day, of course.
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