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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Nadeem Badshah and Andrew Sparrow

No 10 refuses to say if ethics adviser will be replaced following Lord Geidt’s resignation after being put in ‘impossible position’ – as it happened

Christopher Geidt No 10 Boris Johnson Dominic Raab Downing Street (Organization) Today
Boris Johnson has not made a decision on whether to appoint a new ethics adviser.
Boris Johnson has not made a decision on whether to appoint a new ethics adviser. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters

A summary of today's developments

  • The prime minister’s spokeperson refused to confirm that Lord Geidt will definitely be replaced as the PM’s ethics adviser. The spokeperson said that having a process for ensuring standards are maintained by ministers was “vitally important”. Geidt said in his resignation letter that the final straw was a request to consider a proposal that he said would be a “deliberate and purposeful” breach of the ministerial code. He implies that Boris Johnson asked him to approve of this breach.
  • Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Brexit opportunities minister, told Newsnight’s Nicholas Watt that the Geidt resignation saga is really a story about Boris Johnson “protecting the British steel industry”. (See 1.45pm.)
  • At the Downing Street lobby briefing, the prime minister’s spokesperson said ministers would not be getting directly involved in talks to stop the rail strikes next week.
  • Nicola Sturgeon has claimed the Conservatives are “terrified” of another vote on Scottish independence after the party’s leader in Scotland challenged her priorities.
  • Witnesses should not be able to avoid giving evidence at inquiries after “an increasing number of rich and powerful” people have done so in recent years, MPs have said. As PA Media reported, the Commons committee of privileges has published a report recommending the introduction of legislation that would ensure parliament can compel witnesses to turn up to the House of Commons when summoned.

Updated

Hundreds of Ukrainians welcomed to England since Russia’s invasion have been left homeless or are threatened with homelessness, new figures show.

Families allowed to come to the country either to join relatives or as part of the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship scheme have instead found accommodation unavailable or had arrangements to house them break down.

A total of 660 Ukrainian households were owed a statutory homelessness duty by local authorities in England in the period up to 3 June, according to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

A government spokesperson said: “More than 77,200 Ukrainians have arrived in the UK since Putin’s invasion and all arrivals have access to benefits and public services, as well as the right to work or study, from the day they arrive.

“The overwhelming majority of people are settling in well but in the minority of cases where family or sponsor relationships break down, councils have a duty to ensure families are not left without a roof over their head.

“Councils also have access to a rematching service to find a new sponsor in cases under the Homes for Ukraine scheme.”

Updated

Plans for a new inland border facility (IBF) in Dover will no longer go ahead, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has announced.

It was hoped a new facility, located at a business park off the A2 in Kent, would see millions of pounds of investment in the area and create 400 jobs.

However, HMRC has announced it will no longer go ahead with opening the site.

The FDA, the union that represents senior civil servants, has expressed concern about No 10 saying it might not replace Lord Geidt as independent adviser on ministerial standards. Dave Penman, its general secretary, said:

The ministerial code is the only mechanism a civil servant can use to raise a complaint of misconduct, bullying or sexual harassment against a minister.

Confidence in that process has already been severely damaged by the prime minister’s refusal to accept that the home secretary had breached the code, despite being found to have bullied staff.

If the prime minister does not intend to replace Lord Geidt, then he must immediately put in place measures that ensure a civil servant can, with confidence, raise a complaint about ministerial misconduct.

That’s all from me for today. My colleague Nadeem Badshah is now taking over.

In a blog on the Geidt resignation, the legal commentator David Allen Green points out that Brexiters such as Jacob Rees-Mogg used to be rather keen on the idea of trading on WTO terms - terms which, in one case at least, the government now seems willing to ignore. Here’s an extract.

You may recall government-supporters during Brexit clamouring for the United Kingdom to trade on ‘WTO terms’.

It often seemed they did not know what that actually meant, and it was said because it sounded good.

Well.

It seems that the government of the United Kingdom is as contemptuous of this type of international law as it is of others.

Updated

This is from Adam Bienkov at Byline Times.

In the House of Lords there was a repeat of the urgent question on Lord Geidt’s resignation this afternoon. Natalie Bennett, the former Green party leader, asked why “Geidt, an ethics adviser, was asked to give advice on compliance with international law over steel tariffs but Sir James Eadie, first Treasury counsel, was not asked about the legality of plans for the Northern Ireland protocol”. Lord True, the Cabinet Office minister who was responding for the government, said he would not discuss speculative comments on a commercially confidential matter.

Natalie Bennett
Natalie Bennett Photograph: House of Lords

Updated

Ministers have faced questions about why plans to reform the private rented sector did not do more to address rising rents amid the cost of living crisis.

As PA Media reports, the government published a white paper today setting out its plans to make the rented sector fairer. Under the plans, section 21 “no-fault” evictions will be banned, the decent homes standard will be extended to this sector, arbitrary rent review clauses will be disallowed and renters will get extended rights.

The white paper proposes that it also be made illegal for landlords or agents to place blanket bans on renting to families with children or those in receipt of benefits.

The plans in the white paper will form the basis of a renters’ reform bill that the government has promised in this session of parliament.

In the Commons, Matthew Pennycook, the shadow minister for housing and planning, said the plans did not go far enough to protect tenants from steep rent rises. He told MPs:

In none of the coverage this morning or in the white paper itself is there any sign of meaningful proposals to address the problem of unreasonable rent rises.

A one-year rent increase limit, the removal of rent review clauses, and vague assurances about giving tenants the confidence to challenge unjustified increases at tribunal is simply not good enough.

Updated

Geidt resigned as a result of Johnson 'protecting the British steel industry', says Rees-Mogg

Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Brexit opportunities minister, has told Newsnight’s Nicholas Watt that the Geidt resignation saga is really a story about Boris Johnson “protecting the British steel industry”. (See 1.45pm.)

John Pullinger, chair of the Electoral Commission, has said that the Elections Act that became law earlier this year is a threat to the independence of his organisation. The new legislation allows ministers to issue a strategy and policy statement giving directions to the commission and, in an interview with Prospect, Pullinger said this was incomptible with his organisation being independent.

Although he stressed he would continue to do his job independently and impartially, he said:

Most people would think that the government of the day has only one strategy and policy priority for the next election, and that’s to win it for themselves. Powers on the face of a bill like that are inconsistent with the Electoral Commission acting as an independent regulator.

The commission is in charge of ensuring that elections are carried out fairly, and that election spending rules are enforced.

Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross accuses Sturgeon of favouring 'grievance over governing'

Nicola Sturgeon has claimed the Conservatives are “terrified” of another vote on Scottish independence after the party’s leader in Scotland challenged her priorities.

At first minister’s questions Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader, asked why Sturgeon chose this week to make a second independence referendum a priority.

Sturgeon replied:

There is a real desperation at the heart of Douglas Ross’s approach to independence. It’s very telling that he is so terrified of the substantive debate on independence, so terrified of the verdict of the Scottish people on independence, that he’s reduced to somehow trying to pretend that democracy in Scotland is illegal.

It is not a question of whether this government respects the rule of law – we do and always will – the question is, is Douglas Ross a democrat? And I think the glaring answer to that is no.

In response Ross said:

First Minister, your priorities are all wrong at the worst possible time ...

A focus on our recovery, that’s what the Scottish people overwhelmingly want, not a referendum.

We need a strong government for all of Scotland, but we’re getting a weak campaign group for the nationalist minority that values grievance over governing.

Nicola Sturgeon during FMQs today.
Nicola Sturgeon during FMQs today. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA

Updated

Parliament should get power to compel witnesses to give evidence to Commons committees, MPs say

Witnesses should not be able to avoid giving evidence at inquiries after “an increasing number of rich and powerful” people have done so in recent years, MPs have said. As PA Media reports, the Commons committee of privileges has published a report recommending legislation which would ensure parliament can compel witnesses to turn up to the House of Commons when summoned.

Explaining the recommendations, Chris Bryant, who chaired the committee when it was carrying out its inquiry, said:

The right of select committees to summon witnesses and hold the powerful to account cuts to the heart of our parliamentary democracy.

Most witnesses are more than happy to give evidence to a Parliamentary inquiry.

But an increasing number of the rich and powerful have started to resist engaging with select committees in recent years and, in doing so, have shown contempt for Parliament and the people it represents.

From billionaire high street moguls to unaccountable government advisers, these proposals will make it tougher for such individuals to disregard their democratic duty.

Our proposals, if approved by the house, will empower select committees to compel reluctant witnesses to attend or provide documents to parliamentary investigations - allowing committees to conduct their work efficiently and fairly.

The Trade Remedies Authority has put out a statement in response to the letter from Boris Johnson to Lord Geidt earlier today, which says Geidt resigned after being asked to advise on a matter related to the TRA. (See 12.01pm.) The TRA says this refers to a case “called in” by the government, which means ministers have “full decision-making authority” in relation to it.

In other words, the TRA seems to be saying: don’t blame us.

These are from Paul Caruana Galizia from Tortoise, who has a new detail about a well-documented party that Boris Johnson attended in Evgeny Lebedev’s villa in Italy in April 2018.

Updated

Here are two more people who find the circumstances of Lord Geidt’s resignation curious.

This is from Mark Reckless, a former Conservative MP who went on to lead the Brexit party in the Senedd.

And these are from Sir Jonathan Jones, who was head of the government’s legal department until he resigned over the government’s plans to break international law with the internal market bill.

UPDATE: According to David Anderson, a peer and former independent reviewer of terrorist legislation, even though the explicit reference to having to obey international law was removed from the ministerial code (Mark Reckless’s point above), an implicit obligation to follow international law remained.

Updated

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the prime minister’s spokesperson said ministers would not be getting directly involved in talks to stop the rail strikes next week. The spokesperson said:

Broadly speaking, we remain of the position that it is for the unions to negotiated with their employers rather than the government stepping in, there’s no change in that approach.

Proposed legislation to enable the use of agency workers on the railways if the industrial action persists would take “weeks rather than months”, the spokesman added.

The Foreign Office has announced a fresh wave of sanctions against Vladimir Putin’s allies, including on officials involved with the “barbaric treatment of children in Ukraine”, PA Media reports. PA says:

Each individual has been dealt an asset freeze preventing them from dealing with British banks or businesses, and a ban on flying to the UK.

Those sanctioned include the Russian children’s rights commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova, who has been accused of enabling 2,000 vulnerable children to be violently taken from the Donbas region for adoption in Russia.

The measures also apply to the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, who supports Putin’s war, and Sergey Savostyanov, the deputy of the Moscow city Duma.

Speaking in the Commons, Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, said Patriarch Kirill has “repeatedly abused his position to justify the war”.

Updated

This is from Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, on Lord Geidt’s resignation letter.

Lord Geidt walked out because of the odious behaviour of Boris Johnson’s Downing Street. This prime minister has, in his own adviser’s words, made a mockery of the ministerial code. He has now followed both his predecessor and the anti-corruption tsar out of the door in disgust.

There are now no ethics left in this Downing Street regime propped up in office by a Conservative party mired in sleaze and totally unable to tackle the cost of living crisis facing the British people.

Did Boris Johnson deliberately provoke Lord Geidt into resigning? It is normally best to treat conspiracy theories such as this as fiction, but there is something very peculiar about the request from Johnson to Geidt that triggered his resignation. (See 12.01pm and 1.33pm.) In Downing Street they must have known that Geidt was already very close to resigning, because of Partygate. A Partygate resignation, of course, would be damaging to the prime minister. But, as the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope points out, a resignation by Geidt in opposition to a policy supported by the Labour party and designed to protect British jobs in the steel industry? Well, that’s not quite such a bad headline.

Updated

No 10 unable to explain why – in apparently unprecedented move – Geidt was asked to advise on legality of tariff policy

And here are some more lines from what was said at the Downing Street lobby briefing about the resignation of Lord Geidt.

  • The spokesperson was unable to explain why Geidt was being asked to advise the PM on a matter relating to tariff policy. And he failed to give any precedent for Geidt, or his predecessors, giving advice on whether government policy broke international law. One of the odd features of this story is that Geidt was being asked to advise not on the conduct of an individual minister, but on a decision taken by the government as a whole. Boris Johnson said it was a proposal to breach WTO trade rules. (See 12.01pm.) But it is normally for the government law officers to advise on these matters, not the independent adviser on ministers’ interests. Sir Alex Allan was the ethics adviser when the government published its initial internal market bill in 2020, which it admitted would break international law. But there is no evidence Allan was asked if this would be in breach of the ministerial code. And there is no evidence that Geidt was asked about the Northern Ireland protocol bill, which is widely seen as being an even more egregious breach of international law (even though the government claims it is compliant with international treaties). Asked if Geidt had in the past been asked to advise on policies that could be against international law, the spokesperson was unable to answer that. But he also said advice to the PM was confidential.
  • The issue that Geidt was asked to advise on did not relate to Johnson’s personal financial interests. The spokesperson also that, as far as he was aware, the personal finances of other ministers were not involved either. And, asked if Conservative party finances were linked to the issue, he replied:

Not that I am aware of. I have seen speculation to that end, but that’s certainly not my understanding of it.

  • The spokesperson refused to confirm that the dispute between Johnson and Geidt related to tariffs on Chinese steel imports. But he did not deny reports either saying this was the key issue (see 12.44pm).
  • The spokesperson said the government had not yet decided whether to go ahead with the tariff move that Geidt said could be seen as “a deliberate and purposeful breach of the ministerial code”. But he said a decision would be taken “relatively shortly”.

Updated

No 10 refuses to confirm that Johnson will appoint new ethics adviser to replace Lord Geidt

The Downing Street lobby briefing has just finished, and the prime minister’s spokeperson has refused to confirm that Lord Geidt will definitely be replaced as the PM’s ethics adviser.

The spokeperson said that having a process for ensuring standards are maintained by ministers was “vitally important”.

But he said that Geidt himself had raised a number of issues about how the independent adviser on ministers’ interests operated and he said Boris Johnson wanted to “carefully consider those and reflect on them”.

Asked if it was possible that Geidt would not be replaced, the spokesperson replied:

We have not made a final decision on how best to carry out that function, whether it relates to a specific individual or not, particularly given some of the issues that have been raised recently the prime minister alludes to in his letter. So he will carefully consider that before setting out next steps.

Jim Pickard from the FT says the dispute between Boris Johnson and Lord Geidt did relate to steel tariffs, as suggested by trade expert Sam Lowe. (See 12.14pm.)

The Lib Dems are saying Boris Johnson should come to parliament to explain what his dispute with Lord Geidt was about. Wendy Chamberlain, the Lib Dem chief whip, said:

The prime minister now needs to come to parliament and answer questions about these extremely serious allegations ... The public is sick of the constant lies and cover-ups by Boris Johnson and the Conservatives. They deserve the full truth now.

Updated

In his resignation letter (see 11.50am) Lord Geidt says he finally decided to resign after being asked to approve a move that could be “a deliberate and purposeful breach of the ministerial code”.

But he also says by that point he was close to resignation anyway, and he says he got to this point because he was unhappy about the letter Boris Johnson sent him on 31 May in response to the publication of Geidt’s annual report.

Geidt seems to be particularly angry about the suggestion in the PM’s letter that Geidt had not been clear enough in telling Downing Street that he thought Johnson should address the issue of whether he broke the ministerial code when he gave a statement to MPs about Partygate.

Geidt says in his letter.

Your letter in response to my annual report was welcome. It addressed the absence of comment by you about your obligations under that ministerial code up until that point. You explained that, by paying a fixed-term penalty, you had not breached the ministerial code. The letter did not, however, address specifically the criticism in Sue Gray’s report about your adherence to the Nolan principles (on leadership, in particular). Neither did the letter make mention that, despite being repeatedly questioned in the House of Commons about your obligations under the ministerial code (after paying a fixed-penalty notice), your responses again made no reference to it.

I reported to the select committee yesterday that I was satisfied that you had responded to my annual report to explain your position. I am disappointed, however, that the account you gave was not fuller, as noted above. Moreover, I regret the reference to ‘miscommunication’ between our offices, with the implication that I was somehow responsible for you not being fully aware of my concerns. These inconsistencies and deficiencies notwithstanding, I believed that it was possible to continue credibly as independent adviser, albeit by a very small margin.

Updated

Lord Geidt’s resignation letter and Boris Johnson’s response are now on the Downing Street website here.

Sam Lowe, a trade expert who works for the Flint Global consultancy, has posted on Twitter about the dispute that seems to be behind Lord Geidt’s resignation.

Here is Boris Johnson’s reply to Lord Geidt in full.

PM’s reply to Lord Geidt
PM’s reply to Lord Geidt Photograph: No 10

The Downing Street lobby briefing is starting soon. We may get a fuller explanation there of what the WTO tariff issue was that prompted Lord Geidt’s resignation.

Updated

Johnson says proposal that triggered Geidt's resignation involved defying WTO tariff rules to protect a British industry

And here is an extract from Boris Johnson’s reply to Lord Geidt, in which he defends his decision to ask Lord Geidt to approve a decision that Geidt said would have risked a breach of the ministerial code. Johnson said:

You say that you were put in an impossible position regarding my seeking your advice on potential future decisions related to the Trade Remedies Authority. My intention was to seek your advice on the national interest in protecting a crucial industry, which is protected in other European countries and would suffer material harm if we do not continue to apply such tariffs. This has in the past had cross party support. It would be in line with our domestic law but might be seen to conflict with our obligations under the WTO. In seeking your advice before any decision was taken, I was looking to ensure that we acted properly with due regard to the ministerial code.

In his letter Johnson also thanked Geidt for his work and said that his resignation on Wednesday came as a surprise, because on Monday Geidt had told him he would be happy to stay on until the end of the year.

Geidt says he quit because PM put him in 'odious' position asking him to approve 'deliberate' breach of code

Downing Street has now published Lord Geidt’s resignation letter.

Geidt says the final straw was a request to consider a proposal that he said would be a “deliberate and purposeful” breach of the ministerial code. He implies that Boris Johnson asked him to approve of this breach.

Here is the key passage.

This week, however, I was tasked to offer a view about the government’s intention to consider measures which risk a deliberate and purposeful breach of the ministerial code. This request has placed me in an impossible and odious position. My informal response on Monday was that you and any other minister should justify openly your position vis-à-vis the code in such circumstances. However, the idea that a prime minister might to any degree be in the business of deliberately breaching his own code is an affront. A deliberate breach, or even an intention to do so, would be to suspend the provisions of the code to suit a political end. This would make a mockery not only of respect for the code but licence the suspension of its provisions in governing the conduct of Her Majesty’s ministers. I can have no part in this.

And here is the letter in full.

Updated

Shapps urges rail workers not to strike themselves out of job

Next week’s rail strikes are “designed to inflict damage at the worst possible time”, Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has said. In a speech at a train depot in north London, Mr Shapps said:

These strikes are not only a bid to derail reforms that are critical to the network’s future, and designed to inflict damage at the worst possible time, they are also an incredible act of self-harm by the union leadership.

Make no mistake, unlike the past 25 years, when rising passenger demand year after year was taken for granted by the industry, today the railway is in a fight.

It’s not only competing against other forms of public and private transport. It’s in a battle with Zoom, Teams and remote working.

In case the unions haven’t noticed, the world has changed.

Shapps urged rail workers not to strike, saying he thought they were “less militant” than their union leaders.

Don’t risk striking yourselves out of a job. Don’t pitch yourselves against the public. Let’s fix this situation and get back to building a better railway.

Shapps also said the government was planning to introduce a “range of options” to respond to future industrial action, including by making it easier for employers to respond by using agency workers.

According to the Daily Mirror’s Dan Bloom, the transport secretary defended his decision not to talk to the RMT himself about averting the strike, saying this would undermine the position of the employers.

Shapps also denied issuing threats.

Grant Shapps giving a speech at Siemens Traincare Facility Mobility Division Rail Systems in north London.
Grant Shapps giving a speech at Siemens Traincare Facility Mobility Division Rail Systems in north London. Photograph: A/PA

Updated

A further 233 people have been rescued from the Channel and brought ashore, PA Media reports. Warm weather and low winds provided ideal crossing conditions on Tuesday. According to the latest figures from the Ministry of Defence, six boats were intercepted in the Channel on Wednesday and 233 people were rescued and brought to shore.

The UQ on Lord Geidt’s resignation is over.

Mark Spencer, leader of the Commons, has just delivered the business statement, setting out the provisional business in the Commons up to Tuesday 28 June.

There is no mention of the second reading of the Northern Ireland protocol bill. This is the most controversial legislation planned by the government for this session, but ministers do not seem to be in a hurry to debate it.

These are from the Daily Mail’s Jason Groves, who seems to know a bit more about the Geidt resignation letter.

Ellis suggests Harriet Harman should recuse herself from inquiry into whether PM lied to MPs over Partygage

Andrew Murrison (Con) asked if Ellis agreed that “those placed in a position of judgement over others must not have a previously stated position on the matter in question”.

He does not name Harriet Harman, but he is clearly referring to her, and to calls for her to recuse herself from the privileges committee inquiry into claims Boris Johnson lied to parliament over Partygate because of her past tweets about the case.

Ellis says Murrison made “a very good point”. He goes on:

It is an age old principle of natural justice that no person should be a judge in their own cause. Where an individual has given a view on the guilt or innocence of any person, they ought not to then sit in judgement on that person.

Ellis also says he has no doubt that “the right honourable lady” - ie, Harman - will “consider” this point.

Updated

Some Tory MPs are trying to help Ellis by arguing that this UQ is a waste of time. Sheryll Murray said the government should be getting on with delivering for his constituents, and Peter Bone said his constitents did not even know who Geidt was anyway.

Ellis says Geidt came under 'political pressure' from opposition to attack PM

William Wragg (Con), chair of the public administration and constitutional affairs commtitee, says he wants to channel Lady Bracknell; to lose one ethics adviser may be a misfortune, but to lose two looks like carelessness.

He asks if it will take five months to find a replacement, which is what happened when Geidt’s predecessor, Sir Alex Allan, resigned.

Ellis says whoever does the ethics adviser job should not be “under political pressure to attack the prime minister for party political reasons”.

I am sure he will agree with me that it is important to ensure that whoever holds this role is not under constant pressure, political pressure, to attack the prime minister for party political reasons and that if they don’t they are then accused of being a lackey or a patsy.

That is not something that our independent advisers on ministerial interests deserve, we want the best public servants in our public life, we have had one in Lord Geidt and we will further in due course.

Updated

Labour says resignation of second ethics adviser to PM 'badge of shame' for government

Anderson is now responding.

She says the resignation of ethics advisers has now become something of a pattern. Two of them have now resigned. That is a “badge of shame” for the government, she says.

To lose one ethics adviser was really an embarrassment but to lose two in two years, just days after the prime minister’s own anti-corruption tsar walked out on him, well it is becoming a bit of a pattern.

It is a pattern of degrading the principles of our democracy. The prime minister has now driven out both of his hand-picked ethics advisers to resign in despair in two years, it is a badge of shame for this government.

She asks if the new adviser will carry on investigations that are underway. What will happen to the allegation of Islamophobia related to Mark Spencer.

She asks what the other matter briefed by the government overnight is. (See 9.15am.) Did this relate to the PM’s personal intersts?

Ellis says the letters being published will speak for themselves.

Updated

Ellis has finished. He has not told us anything new about why Geidt resigned.

Ellis says the powers of the independent adviser on ministers’ interests have changed.

He now has the power to initiate an investigation, Ellis says.

And he says the ministerial code accepts there should be a proportionate range of sanctions available for ministers who break the code. Previously, resignation was theoretically the only sanction.

Ellis says it has also been agreed that the adviser will be consulted on changes to the ministerial code.

No 10 will release Geidt's resignation letter, MPs told

Fleur Anderson from Labour asks the question, asking for a statement.

Michael Ellis, the Cabinet Office minister, starts by thanking Lord Geidt for his work. He says he holds him in highest regard.

MPs will recognise that Geidt has demonstrated “diligence and thoughfulness” in the way he has carried out his job.

He says Geidt’s letter and the PM’s reply to it will be deposited in the house - ie, published for MPs, which means we will all get the chance to read them - shortly.

Commons urgent question on Geidt's resignation

The Commons UQ on Lord Geidt’s resignation will be starting shortly.

The ministerial response, from Michael Ellis, the Cabinet Office minister, will be the “update” promised by Dominic Raab this morning.

From Insider’s Henry Dyer

Raab says he wants to stop UK being bound by injunctions from European court of human rights

The deportation flight to Rwanda was stopped from leaving the UK on Tuesday night not because the European court of human rights ruled that the policy was illegal, but because the court granted what was effectively an injunction saying the removal of one of the people on the flight should be halted.

In interviews this morning Dominic Raab, the justice secretary and deputy PM, said the UK government wanted to stop the court having that sort of power of injunction in Britain. He said the government’s bill of rights - legislation promised in the Queen’s speech amending the Human Rights Act - would address this. He told Times Radio:

In relation to the latest intervention from Strasburg, so called rule 39 interim orders, which are not grounded in the European convention [on human rights], they’re based on the rules of procedure, internal rules of the court. I certainly believe - and our bill of rights would provide - that they should not have legally binding effect under UK law.

In terms of the rule of law, I think when the high court, the court of appeal, have considered the matter, the supreme court, and said there is no grounds for an appeal, it is not right. And there is no basis in the European convention for Strasburg to intervene.

I’ve always said I think we should stay a state party [to the court]. But I think it requires us to respect the obligations, but also the Strasburg court to respect the limits of its mandate and it’s a two way street.

Updated

Waiting list for hospital treatment in England reaches 6.5m - new record high

The number of people in England waiting to start routine hospital treatment has risen to a new record high, PA Media reports. PA says:

A total of 6.5 million people were waiting to start treatment at the end of April, NHS England said.

This is up from 6.4 million in March and is the highest number since records began in August 2007.

The number of people having to wait more than 52 weeks to start hospital treatment in England stood at 323,093 in April, up from 306,286 the previous month.

The Government and NHS England have set the ambition of eliminating all waits of more than a year by March 2025.

Journalists often like to take credit for forcing the resignation of politicians or senior public figures. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein set this as a benchmark for journalistic virility with Watergate and - rightly or wrongly - this has been a feature of newspaper culture ever since.

Normally it is news reporters or investigative journalists who get to claim scalps. But in the case of Lord Geidt, it may be the sketchwriters - including my colleague, John Crace - who forced him out. Geidt experienced a very bruising session with the Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee on Tuesday, but facing the questions can’t have been as painful as reading about it in the papers the following day. Here is John’s sketch.

On Sky News this morning Dominic Raab, the justice secretary and deputy PM, said he thought the committee hearing was a factor in Geidt’s resignation. He said:

He had a pretty rough grilling by MPs this week, I think sometimes we in the media and as politicians maybe underestimate how civil servants feel with that kind of scrutiny.

Raab is right to say Geidt is someone who for most of his career has not had to put up with media vilification. For 10 years he was private secretary to the Queen and in that post he was regarded as a sophisticated establishment powerbroker.

Being turned into a figure of ridicule at the select comittee can’t have been pleasant for him. But the hearing did also force him to face questions about his own role that he found hard to answer.

Cabinet Office minister to respond to Commons urgent question about Geidt's resignation at 10.30am

A Cabinet Office minister will answer an urgent question about the resignation of Lord Geidt at 10.30am in the Commons. The UQ has been tabled by Labour’s Fleur Anderson, the shadow paymaster general, and so we will probably get a reply from Michael Ellis, paymaster general and minister for the Cabinet Office. When a minister is needed in the Commons to make a statement that involves defending Boris Johnson’s integrity, it’s normally Ellis who gets the call.

No 10 under pressure to publish Lord Geidt’s resignation letter

Good morning. More than a year ago, after he was first appointed as Boris Johnson’s independent adviser on ministers’ interests (official title) or “ethics adviser” (media shorthand), Lord Geidt said that, if Johnson ignored his advice, he could retaliate by resigning “as a last resort”. He told MPs: “The power is there.” Last night, in a surprise move, he used it. Our overnight story about his departure is here.

Geidt’s resignation provides a fresh component to the (extraordinarily long) catalogue of evidence testifying to the ethical incontinence of the Boris Johnson administration. Regular readers will not need reminder of what else is on the list (and, besides, it would take a while just typing it up).

But Geidt has not given a proper account of why he quit. We know that he was unhappy about the fact that Johnson initially withheld important evidence from him when he was investigating the funding of the Downing Street flat refurbishment (Johnson claims that this was a mistake), and we know that Geidt was concerned about Johnson not seeming to care whether his Partygate fine meant he had broken the ministerial code. But last night Geidt just issued a one-sentence explanation for his departure, saying: “With regret, I feel that it is right that I am resigning from my post as independent adviser on ministers’ interests.”

The government has put out a statement suggesting the resignation was linked to Geidt being asked to look at “a commercially sensitive matter in the national interest, which has previously had cross-party support”, but it has not said what this means.

Geidt wrote a resignation letter to the PM and this morning the government is under pressure to publish it. Sir Philip Mawer, who did Geidt’s job when Gordon Brown was prime minister, told the Today programme:

If the letter and the prime minister’s reply are not published, then I think people will draw their own conclusions and it won’t be favourable to the prime minister.

And Chris Bryant, the Labour MP who chairs the Commons standards committee, said the same. He told the programme:

Reading between the lines and between all the various different reports he has produced, he [Lord Geidt] basically thinks that the Prime Minister has broken the ministerial code himself. He feels that because the only person who is the arbiter of the code is the prime minister that he does not feel able to say that.

Dominic Raab, the justice secretary and deputy PM, was giving interviews on behalf of the government this morning and, on the Today programme, he professed to not even know whether Geidt had written a resignation letter. Asked if it would be published, he replied:

I know No 10 will give a proper update later today and these questions will be answered.

Here is the agenda for the day.

10am: Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, gives a speech on rail reform.

11.30am: Downing Street holds its lobby briefing.

12pm: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, takes questions from MSPs.

I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.

If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.

Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com

Updated

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