Closing summary
Here is a round-up of the day’s news stories from Westminster:
Boris Johnson has said he would “never have dreamed” of intentionally misleading the House of Commons over Downing Street gatherings as he published a defence dossier he hopes will exonerate him from claims he lied to parliament. The former prime minister admitted he misled the Commons by telling MPs that strict Covid rules and guidance had been followed in No 10 at all times – but he said his comments were made “in good faith”.
In his submission to the privileges committee Johnson says it remains “a mystery” to him why he was fined by the Met police for attending the birthday party/gathering in the cabinet room on 19 June but other people who were there were not. He says: “Some attendees did not receive fixed-penalty notices, so the police must have decided that they nevertheless had reasonable excuses for being there. What those excuses were, and why the police decided that I did not have one remains a mystery to me.”
Johnson has said he is “very much” looking forward to his appearance before MPs investigating whether he knowingly misled parliament over partygate. In a statement ahead of Wednesday’s hearing of the Commons privileges committee, the former prime minister said: “I look forward very much to the committee session tomorrow. I believe that the evidence conclusively shows that I did not knowingly or recklessly mislead parliament. The committee has produced not a shred of evidence to show that I have.”
On the eve of Johnson’s appearance before the Commons privilege committee, Labour confirmed its candidate to contest his Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat at the next parliamentary election. The Uxbridge and South Ruislip Constituency Labour party selected Danny Beales to go up against the former prime minister, who was re-selected as the Tory candidate for the seat.
The UK home secretary has been accused of being “dangerously complacent” in tackling the major failings within the police service highlighted in the damning Casey review and urged to suspend immediately all officers being investigated for domestic violence and sexual assault claims. The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, told the Commons that Suella Braverman’s response to the 300-page report into the culture within the Metropolitan police was a continuation of the “hands-off” approach at the Home Office that Louise Casey has criticised.
Keir Starmer has said that the Metropolitan police chief, Sir Mark Rowley, must act “further and faster” to deliver the change needed as a result of the Casey review While he had confidence in the head of Scotland Yard, the Labour leader criticised the government’s “hands off approach” to delivering police reform and committed a Labour government under his leadership to introducing mandatory national rules for police forces on vetting. It was “extraordinary” that this was not already in place, he added, especially after the examples of violence against women from police officers.
Rishi Sunak is set to push his revamped Northern Ireland protocol through the Commons despite hardline Conservative Brexiters rejecting the plan as an unacceptable failure that does not deliver any of its stated claims. The verdict of the European Research Group (ERG), which followed a similar rejection by the Democratic Unionist party on Monday, means Sunak is likely to face a Tory rebellion over the revised post-Brexit trade arrangements in Northern Ireland on Wednesday, although it appears unlikely to be significant.
The government will bring forward changes to its levelling up bill aimed at tackling problems with Airbnbs and other short-term lets, Michael Gove has said. Speaking in the budget debate, the levelling up secretary said ministers will make changes aimed at restricting “the way that homes can be turned into Airbnbs”, as he acknowledged a problem with holiday lets preventing younger workers from living and finding a job near to home.
The DUP will not resume power sharing at Stormont yet because it is not willing to “roll over” until its demands for changes to the Northern Ireland protocol are met, Sammy Wilson said this morning. The DUP MP was speaking on Good Morning Ulster in response to a question from Colum Eastwood, the SDLP leader, who asked Wilson when the DUP would lift its boycott of the power-sharing executive. Without the DUP it cannot function, and the DUP has been refusing to participate for more than a year because of its opposition to the protocol.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the UK politics live blog for today. Thanks for following along. Goodnight.
Keir Starmer has said that the Metropolitan police chief, Sir Mark Rowley, must act “further and faster” to deliver the change needed as a result of the Casey review
While he had confidence in the head of Scotland Yard, the Labour leader criticised the government’s “hands off approach” to delivering police reform and committed a Labour government under his leadership to introducing mandatory national rules for police forces on vetting.
It was “extraordinary” that this was not already in place, he added, especially after the examples of violence against women from police officers.
Starmer said the “biggest danger” after Louise Casey’s damning review, which found the force institutionally racist, misogynist and homophobic, is that it “becomes just another report rather than the beginning of real, lasting change”.
The review, commissioned following Sarah Everard’s murder, warned there may be more officers like killer Wayne Couzens and serial rapist David Carrick.
