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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow (now); Jamie Grierson and Martin Farrer (earlier)

Sajid Javid disowns 'hostile environment' phrase in first outing as home secretary – as it happened

Afternoon summary

  • Sajid Javid has used his first appearance in the Commons has home secretary to promise to “do right by the Windrush generation”. He told MPs:

We will do right by the Windrush generation.

I want to start by making a pledge, a pledge to those from the Windrush generation who have been in this country for decades and yet have struggled to navigate through the immigration system: This never should have been the case and I will do whatever it takes to put it right.

He also stressed how his immigrant background meant that he felt particularly strongly about the need to sort out this problem.

Like the Caribbean Windrush generation, my parents came to this country from the Commonwealth in the 1960s. They too came to help rebuild this country and offer all that they had. So when I heard that people who were long-standing pillars of their community were being impacted for simply not having the right documents to prove their legal status in the UK, I thought that it could be my mum, my brother, my uncle or even me.

That’s why I am so personally committed to and invested in resolving the difficulties faced by the people of the Windrush generation who have built their lives here and contributed so much.

Javid received a warm reception from Conservative MPs. But, although he repeatedly stressed his desire to ensure Windrush migrants get treated fairly, he said nothing to suggest that he plans to change immigration policy in any substantial way from what happened under his predecessor. Labour MPs said he should be judged by his actions, not his words.

  • He said that he disliked the term “hostile environment” as a description of Home Office policy relating to immigrants and that he would not be using the term. He said:

I think the terminology is incorrect, I think it’s a phrase that is unhelpful and does not represent the values as a country.

He said he preferred to talk about having a “compliant environment”. This sounded like a new departure, but the Home Office ditched the “hostile environment” terminology some time ago.

  • He told MPs that the Home Office’s Windrush taskforce has received 6,000 calls, of which around 2,500 have been identified as Windrush cases. More than 500 appointments have been scheduled and over 100 cases have been successfully resolved, he said.
  • He claimed that the Immigration Act 2014 did not remove a protection against deportation available to Windrush migrants. (See 4.26pm, 4.29pm and 4.50pm.) Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, said the government should re-instate this protection. Javid told her there was no need. He told her:

No such protections have been removed. People who arrived pre-1973 - they have the absolute right to be here and that has not changed.

As the Guardian reported last month, a clause giving longstanding Commonwealth residents protection from enforced removal was taken off the statute book by the 2014 Act, although the Home Office claims it was redundant.

  • The Labour MP Stella Creasy told Javid that she has encountered three constituency cases of Windrush migrants being deported.

That’s all from me for tonight.

Thanks for the comments.

Updated

The Home Office has launched at least four inquires into leaks relating to Amber Rudd and Windrush, according to BuzzFeed’s Patrick Smith. At least three of them went to the Guardian.

DUP criticise Irish PM over visit to Northern Ireland

The Irish taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, has been accused of “poor manners” by a DUP MP for failing to follow protocol ahead of a visit to Northern Ireland. As the Press Association reports, Varadkar headed north with EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier who was accused by DUP party leader Arlene Foster of not understanding unionist culture. Varadkar and Barnier had earlier met in Dundalk on Monday morning at a conference focused on Brexit. Varadkar travelled to Northern Ireland, in a move described by the DUP as “outside of normal protocol”.

The DUP MP Jeffrey Donaldson said:

Leo Varadkar’s visit is another demonstration of the poor manners and disrespect which appears to be the Irish government’s Brexit strategy.

Having told unionists just over a month ago that he recognised statements and actions by the Irish government were unhelpful or intrusive, he follows this up with a visit which no local representative is informed about and none of the other normal protocol is followed.

It is increasingly apparent that the Irish government does not seem to care about securing a sensible and pragmatic outcome from Brexit which can work for both Northern Ireland and the Republic.

Their preferred approach is to use Brexit in whatever way possible to undermine Northern Ireland and particularly its constitutional position.

Leo Varadkar (left) and Michel Barnier during a press conference at Dundalk Institute of Technology.
Leo Varadkar (left) and Michel Barnier during a press conference at Dundalk Institute of Technology. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

This is from Stefan Rousseau, the Press Association’s chief political photographer.

Back in the Commons the Labour MP Rachael Maskell said that Amber Rudd wrote to Theresa May explaining her plan to increase deportations. She said that suggested that Theresa May was “complicit’ in everything that happened.

Javid refused to address that point. He just said Rudd was a “fantastic leader” of her department.

Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, says the government defeat on the EU withdrawal bill is “hugely significant”. In a statement he said:

This is a hugely significant moment in the fight to ensure parliament has a proper role in the Brexit negotiations and that we avoid a no deal situation.

Labour won the argument at the end of last year for parliament to be given a meaningful vote on the terms of our withdrawal from the EU. And we are clear that it must be just that: a meaningful vote.

If parliament votes down the article 50 deal, then parliament must decide what happens next. Under no circumstances can the prime minister be given a blank cheque to crash the UK out of the EU without a deal.

I would urge the prime minister to accept this cross-party amendment and recognise that there is no majority in parliament or the country for a no deal Brexit.

The Labour MP Emma Hardy says that the Home Office website says Windrush migrants have only two weeks to contact the helpline. Will he get that statement removed?

Javid says he will look into that.

Brexit minister says Lords defeat will 'weaken UK's hand' in talks with EU

The Brexit department has issued this statement about the Lords vote. It is from Lord Callanan, a Brexit minister.

We are disappointed that the House of Lords has voted for this amendment in spite of the assurances we have provided

What this amendment would do is weaken the UK’s hand in our negotiations with the EU by giving parliament unprecedented powers to instruct the government to do anything with regard to the negotiations – including trying to keep the UK in the EU indefinitely.

It is absolutely right that parliament is able to scrutinise the final deal, and that is why we have already committed to giving both Houses a vote on the final deal.

We will now consider the implications of the House of Lords’ decision.

Updated

Labour’s Liz McInnes asks Javid to confirm that Windrush migrants have more than two weeks got get their citizenship regularised.

Javid says he is not aware of a deadline.

Peers defeat government by 91 votes on motion to beef up parliament's 'meaningful vote' powers over Brexit

The government has lost the vote on amendment 49 in the Lords by 335 votes to 244 - a majority of 91. (See 2.32pm, 3.58pm and 4.20pm.)

This amendment would beef up parliament’s “meaningful vote” powers in relation to Brexit. In particular, it would ensure that a vote against the withdrawal agreement would not automatically lead to the UK leaving the EU with no deal.

Updated

In the Lords peers are now voting on amendment 49 to the EU withdrawal bill. (See 3.58pm and 4.20pm.)

Labour’s Chuka Umunna asks what Javid will do differently from Amber Rudd.

Javid asks Umunna to give him time.

Sajid Javid said earlier that Diane Abbott was wrong to say some protections for Windrush migrants were removed by the 2014 Immigration Act. (See 4.29pm.)

According to this article by my colleague Diane Taylor, on that point the evidence is against him.

Updated

Javid says he opposes 'hostile environment' term and will not be using it

Stephen Doughty, the Labour MP, asks how many people have been wrongfully deported or detained. And will Javid scrap the net deportations target?

Javid says he is not currently aware of any cases of wrongful deportation.

He says he will not be using the term hostile environment. That does not represent our values. This is about creating a compliant environment, he says.

UPDATE: This is from Alan Travis, the Guardian’s former home affairs editor.

Updated

Anna Soubry, a Conservative, says the Windrush situation was the natural consequence of a system that assumed people were here illegally. People had to prove they were here legally. Will Javid commit to a radical rehaul of all these policies?

Javid says he wants an immigration system that behaves more humanely. He will look at this very carefully.

Sir Bill Cash, a Conservative, asks if Javid will legislate to guarantee the Windrush migrants their rights.

Javid says he will consider all legislative options.

Javid says he does not want anyone in the UK to go through the experience the Windrush migrants suffered.

Sir Roger Gale, a Conservative, quotes from a Windrush migrant interviewed on the radio this morning who said, as a legal migrant, he backed tackling illegal immigration.

Javid says he did not hear the interview, but he agrees with the sentiment.

Sir Vince Cable, the Lib Dem leader, asks Javid to publish the report the foreign secretary in 2016 (Philip Hammond) wrote about the Windrush situation, following his meeting with Caribbean leaders.

Javid says he will consider this.

Yvette Cooper, the Labour chair of the home affairs committee, says the Home Office got a large number of these decisions wrong. Will he look again at reinstating independent appeals and legal aid to prevent injustices happening? This is about creating a fair country, she says.

Javid says he will consider these issues.

He says he has asked to see internal migration targets before he decides what to do next.

Damian Green, the former first secretary, says Javid will have support from the Tory benches. He asks for an update on the Windrush taskforce.

Javid says 100 cases have already been successfully resolved.

The SNP’s justice and home affairs spokewoman, Joanna Cherry, calls for a root-and-branch review of the policies that led to the Windrush disaster. She says what happened to the Windrush generation is a direct result of the policies introduced by Theresa May. And she asks Javid to agree to Scotland having control of immigration policy.

Javid says Cherry will be seeing action and the right policies from his deparment.

He says he is committed to a fair and humane immigration policy. But at the same time he wants to clamp down decisively on illegal immigration.

This is from the Times’ Patrick Kidd.

Javid says he is angry about how the Windrush generation were treated. He is a second generation immigrant too.

He says Abbott does not have a monopoly on anger.

He says Abbott was wrong to say protections were removed in 2014. People who came to the UK have an absolute right to be here, he says. That did not change.

He says is is not aware of anyone being wrongly deported. But the Home Office is still being investigated.

He concludes by saying he hopes Abbott will work with the government to put these problems right.

Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, asks Javid to restore the protections that Commonwealth migrants had before the 2014 Immigration Act was passed.

She says Javid will have to give details of the compensation scheme soon.

She says the Windrush generation are her parent’s generation. She says Javid will be judged not by what he says, but by what he does.

Sajid Javid tells MPs he is making pledge to 'do right by the Windrush generation'

Sajid Javid, the new home secretary, responds to the UQ on Windrush.

He says he wants to start with a pledge; he will do everything he can to put the Windrush problems right.

He says, as a second generation immigrant, he feels the problems intensely. He says he knows these problems could have happened to his family.

He says he will implement the proposals announced by Amber Rudd last week, he says. And he says the Home Office will legislate to ensure the rights of Windrush migrants.

Over 100 people have already got their papers, he says. And he says 500 appointments have been made with the taskforce.

He ends saying:

We will do right by the Windrush generation.

More from the House of Lords debate on amendment 49 to the EU withdrawal bill. (See 3.58pm.)

From Michael Howard, the former Conservative leader

I have great respect for all the proposers of this motion, which makes me all the more astonished that they should put forward a clause that could, and very probably would, lead to not one but several constitutional crisis. I am reluctant to draw the conclusion that is the intention, that so determined are its movers to thwart the will of the British people that they wish to provoke a constitutional crisis, [but] that is the perilous outcome to which this opens the door.

The new clause which stands in his name goes far beyond the fine sentiments he addressed. It gives the Lords a veto on any agreement which the government has reached and which the other place [the Commons] has endorsed. The other place is not a negotiating body, it has never taken that role, I don’t believe it wants that role and I don’t believe it should have that role ...

It would immeasurably weaken the government’s negotiating position with the EU and would I believe make our government and our country a laughing stock.

From Douglas Hogg (Viscount Hailsham)

This new clause is designed to ensure that the future of our country is determined by parliament and not by ministers. The prime minister has promised parliament a meaningful vote. In a parliamentary system of government ... we have a right and a duty to determine what is meant by a meaningful vote.

When the negotiations are concluded, both country and parliament will be asked to consider the outcome, terms or no terms. The question that will then arise is what should be the role of parliament? If terms have been agreed, the choices available to parliament ... should be obviously to accept those terms or reject those terms, but if the decision is to reject those terms, parliament should have the right to suggest further negotiations, or to determine we leave without terms, to crash out, or to determine we stay in the European Union on the existing terms.

In other words, whatever the outcome, terms or no terms, this country’s future should be determined by parliament. In a parliamentary democracy, this is what meant by a meaningful vote.

Updated

London/Edinburgh relations have reached 'lowest ebb' over Brexit, says Scottish government minister

A Scottish government minister has told how trust with Westminster has reached its “lowest ebb”. As the Press Association reports, it comes as research by a Commons committee found just one in 1,000 people believe the two governments work well together. The PA story goes on:

The public administration and constitutional affairs select committee found 0.1% of people believe the two administrations work well together, while an overwhelmingly 98.7% said they did not.

That was the view of respondents to the committee’s public forum on Scottish devolution.

MPs from the committee met in Edinburgh as the stand-off between the Scottish and UK governments over post-Brexit powers continues.

Ministers at Holyrood are still refusing to give their consent to the EU withdrawal bill, with opposition continuing after their counterparts in Wales withdrew their objections to the legislation.

But Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard, as well as Wille Rennie from the Liberal Democrats and Patrick Harvie of the Scottish Greens, backed the SNP stance on this - demanding more changes from the UK government.

While Scottish Brexit minister Mike Russell stressed the Scottish government still wanted to give legislative consent to the bill, the “core issue” had not been resolved.

He insisted that as it stands it would mean “the Scottish parliament will have its legislative competence very substantially overruled for a substantial period of time, not just in the 24 areas that are likely to be the subject of frameworks, but in any other area that the UK government chooses”.

However he told the committee: “We’ve got ourselves I’m afraid to the stage where there is a very substantial lack of trust on both sides.”

As ministers at Holyrood have not been able to agree to the bill the Scottish bovernment has passed its own Brexit continuity legislation - although this is being challenged by the UK government.

Russell said: “What I think it does reflect regretably is that the trust on which the relationship has to be based is at a pretty low ebb, probably the lowest ebb I have experienced.”

Mike Russell, the Scottish government’s Brexit minister.
Mike Russell, the Scottish government’s Brexit minister. Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Jeremy Corbyn’s ratings among the public and Labour supporters have dropped to the lowest level since before last year’s general election, according to an Ipsos MORI poll reported in the Evening Standard.

Here is an article by Sajid Javid on his upbringing.

In the Lords peers have now started debating the Viscount Hailsham (Douglas Hogg) amendment that would force the government to comply with motions passed by parliament ordering a new approach to the Brexit negotiations if MPs and peers reject the withdrawal deal in the autumn. It is amendment 49.

You can read the full wording here (pdf).

Just to confuse things, there is another amendment being debated this afternoon, amendment 51, relating to parliament and the Brexit negotiations. This has been tabled by the Labour peer Lord Monks, and it would oblige the government to get parliamentary approval for its Brexit negotiating mandate.

Amendment 51 would tie the hands of the government more than amendment 49, which would only really kick in in the event of the withdrawal agreement being rejected by parliament in the autumn.

The government does not like either amendment, but Labour believes that ministerial warnings, like David Davis’s Sun article today, are deliberately trying to conflate the two amendments so as to make amendment 49 (the gentler one) look more hostile than it actually is.

Here is a line from the opening of the debate. It’s from the BBC’s Esther Webber.


As Sky’s Faisal Islam reports, one of the first things Sajid Javid will find in his in-tray at the Home Office will be a letter from Guy Verhofstadt, the European parliament’s lead Brexit spokesman, warning him that EU nationals living in the UK are worried about getting the Windrush treatment.

Jeremy Corbyn has been tweeting about his meeting with Windrush generation migrants today.

James Brokenshire is in the Commons now taking questions in his new post as housing and communities secretary. In response to the first question, he says he wants to continue with his predecessor, Sajid Javid’s, policy of promoting the building of more homes, and particularly affordable homes.

The Windrush UQ now won’t start until after 4.15pm.

Perhaps they’ve changed the timings to give Sajid Javid an extra 45 minutes to master his new brief.

Lunchtime summary

  • Sajid Javid has been appointed home secretary to replace Amber Rudd following her resignation late last night. The son of an immigrant bus driver who earned millions in the City before becoming an MP in 2010, Javid is the first BAME politician, and the first person of Muslim heritage, to hold one of the so-called great offices of state (the top four jobs in government). Theoretically this could lead to changes in government immigration policy, and to the standing of the Conservative party with BAME voters (which is currently very low), and yesterday Javid stressed that his own family could easily have been caught up in the Windrush scandal. (See 9.59am.) But in his very first remarks in his new job he has proposed continuity with the policies proposed by Amber Rudd last week, not a radical new departure. (See 11.48am.)
  • Javid has been summoned to the Commons to respond to an urgent question on Windrush. It was tabled by Labour, one of several opposition parties urging Javid to dismantle the “hostile environment” migration strategy developed by the Home Office in recent years. (See 1.45pm.) The UQ will start at 3.30pm.
Sajid Javid outside the Home Office.
Sajid Javid outside the Home Office. Photograph: Chris J Ratcliffe/Getty Images
  • The government has said that the EU withdrawal bill will become “unworkable” if peers vote for an amendment to it this afternoon that would force the government to comply with motions passed by parliament ordering a new approach to the Brexit negotiations if MPs and peers reject the withdrawal deal in the autumn. The vote is coming this afternoon and the government is expecting to lose by a large margin. The amendment in question, tabled by the Conservative former minister Douglas Hogg, is highly technical, but Christopher Howarth has an explanation here, on the pro-Brexit BrexitCentral website. In a tweet this morning the Brexit minister Steve Baker said:

But Lord Heseltine, the Conservative former deputy prime minister and a support of the amendment, told the World at One that Brexiters like Davis were being hypocritical. He said:

The weakness in David Davis and the Brexiters’ position is that they think that the absolute position is sovereign over parliament. And yet they are constantly saying in their public utterances they want sovereignty returned to this country. Well, what does that mean? It means returning sovereignty to parliament.

According to the Press Association, Theresa May was asked three times on an election visit to a primary school in Manchester if the Windrush scandal was a resignation matter for her or something she should take responsibility for. She brushed aside the calls for her resignation and defended her policy. She said:

The Windrush generation came here, that generation who came here before 1973 have built our country, they are part of us, they are British and what they weren’t given when they came here, prior to 1973, was the documents that show their right to be here.

What we are now doing is, for those who don’t have those documents, for those who are anxious, the Home Office has set up a team that will work with them to ensure that they have those documents, that they get that reassurance that they will be wanting and we encourage anybody who is anxious about their position to get in touch with that Home Office team because they are there to ensure that they can have the documents that they need.

Asked if the Windrush scandal would affect the results of Thursday’s local elections, she replied:

I think when people go to the polls on Thursday they will be asking [themselves] who do they want to see as their local councillors, who do they want to see running their local councils and when they do that they will ask themselves who is going to provide good services, who is going to keep council tax low? As Trafford council shows, it is the Conservatives that provide good quality services and keep the council tax low.

Theresa May sits with pupils during a visit to Brooklands Primary School in Sale, near Manchester.
Theresa May sits with pupils during a visit to Brooklands Primary School in Sale, near Manchester. Photograph: Oli Scarff/PA

Javid to respond to urgent question on Windrush

Sajid Javid will respond to the urgent question on Windrush, Sky’s Aubrey Allegretti reports.

Sajid Javid urged to reset Home Office policy on immigration

It is not just the Labour party (see 11.22am and 1.05pm) saying Sajid Javid should reset Home Office policy on immigration. Here are three political parties and one thinktank saying much the same.

From Joanna Cherry, the SNP’s justice and home affairs spokesperson

I welcome Sajid Javid to his role but the UK Home Office needs much more than a change of personnel.

The blame for the Windrush scandal lies firmly at the door of Theresa May and her toxic Tory immigration policies. The Home Secretary must immediately undertake a root and branch review of UK immigration policy, scrap the UK government’s damaging arbitrary net migration targets, and end its inhumane hostile environment approach.

From Ed Davey, the Lib Dem home affairs spokesman

Today [Javid] walks into a department that has slashed police budgets and police numbers, presided over a rise in serious violent crime and cultivated an obsession with hardline policies on immigrants, personified by the Windrush scandal.

He has to bring forward plans to invest more money in community policing, provide certainty to the Windrush generation and start providing answers on what future the 3 million EU citizens in this country would face under the Conservatives’ Brexit deal.

From the Green MP Caroline Lucas

To instill confidence in Parliament, Javid must now embark on a change of direction, which sees migrants treated fairly, and EU nationals given the assurances they deserve as we approach the Brexit crunch.

From Sunder Katwala, director of the British Future thinktank

No new home secretary have faced such a challenging inbox: the Windrush scandal, settling the status of 3 million EU nationals in the UK and creating a new immigration system for post-Brexit Britain. But Sajid Javid also has an opportunity for reforms to get things right.

Windrush shows how immigration can still seem like the most difficult and polarizing issue in politics - and one from which governments can’t run away. The answer for Sajid Javid is to grasp this ‘Reset Moment’. Most of the British public are ‘balancers’ on immigration, wanting a system that is effective, fair and humane. They should be engaged more in the choices we make on this issue.

This is from HuffPost’s Paul Waugh.

Speaker grants urgent question on Windrush scandal

John Bercow, the speaker, has granted an urgent question on Windrush.

Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, wants Theresa May to respond. It is not clear yet whether she will get May, or another minister.

Corbyn says Rudd's resignation means May has lost her 'human shield'

Jeremy Corbyn has recorded a clip for broadcasters about Amber Rudd’s resignation and Sajid Javid’s appointment. Corbyn, of course, called for Rudd’s resignation at PMQs last week. Here are the main points.

  • Corbyn said May had lost her “human shield” and that she should now reflect on her own role in the Windrush scandal. Asked about May’s position, he said:

I think [May] should reflect on the hostile environment that she created as home secretary, and the fact that she dismissed in terms warnings given to her by Diane Abbott and others during the debates about the 2014 Act, in which they said, this will affect the Windrush generation.

Amber Rudd has been the human shield for Theresa May, and she’s now gone. Theresa May now has questions to answer – from the liaison committee or wherever else those questions are raised – about what she actually did as home secretary and what she said.

  • He said Rudd was right to resign.

[Rudd] had to resign because, quite clearly, what she had been telling us was not accurate and not correct, and she had to go as a result of that.

  • He said Javid should dismantle the hostile environment policy. Asked if he had confidence in Javid, he said:

I’ll have confidence if he makes it very, very clear that he will deal with the issues that Amber Rudd failed to deal with, that he will deal with the issue of the hostile environment created by her and her predecessor as home secretary, now the prime minister, and that he will guarantee, absolutely, security and safety for the Windrush generation, who have contributed so much to our country and are now being put through the most appalling trauma.

Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Corbyn Photograph: BBC News/BBC

According to the Evening Standard, Hugh Ind, director general of Immigration Enforcement at the Home Office, emailed Amber Rudd’s team before and during the home affairs committee last week to say there were no removal targets. “This email was the basis of Rudd’s confusion,” says the Standard. George Osborne, the Standard editor, former Conservative chancellor and a supporter of Rudd’s, says that Rudd was misled and that this is “extraordinary”.

UDPATE: Asked to comment on the story, a Home Office spokesperson said:

We do not routinely comment on leaked documents.

Updated

May admits she knew Home Office had targets for removing illegal immigrants.

Here is more from the clip that Theresa May recorded for Sky News.

  • May rejected the suggestion that Amber Rudd resigned over policy decisions that were May’s responsibility. When it was put to her that she personally should be taking responsibility for the Home Office’s “hostile environment” strategy, May said:

Amber Rudd was very clear about the reasons why she has resigned – that was because of information she gave to the House of Commons which was not correct.

If you look at what we’re doing as a government, and have been doing over the years as a government, what we are doing is responding to the need that people see for a government to deal with illegal immigration. That’s exactly what we are doing.

Now, we have seen the Windrush generation being caught up in way that has caused anxiety among that generation. That’s why we have set up a unit that is helping those people to get the documents that they need.

They are British, they are part of us. But we deal with that, we make sure that people are given the reassurance that they need, but we also need to ensure that we’re dealing with illegal immigration.

This is yet another example of May trying to turn the Windrush scandal into a public argument about illegal immigration. The counter argument is that policies intended to target illegal immigrants have ended up impacting on legal immigrants too.

  • She confirmed that she knew that the Home Office had targets for the removal of illegal immigrants. Asked if she knew about the targets, she replied:

When I was home secretary, yes, there were targets in terms of removing people from the country, who were here illegally.

There is an argument that this shows May was complicit in Amber Rudd misleading the House of Commons when she gave evidence to the home affairs committee on Wednesday afternoon. But given that May may have had other things to do on Wednesday afternoon other than monitor the committee hearing minute by minute, and given that Rudd went to the Commons first thing on Thursday morning to correct what she had said, it may be hard to make this charge stick. (If May herself were on record denying the existence of targets, that would be a different matter.)

  • She paid tribute to Rudd. Saying she was “very sorry” at Rudd’s departure, she said:

I think she can look back with pride on her time as home secretary.

Theresa May
Theresa May Photograph: Sky News

Updated

No 10 confirmed at its daily briefing for political reporters that the prime minister spoke to Amber Rudd early on Sunday evening from her constituency home.

But her official spokesman quashed rumours that Rudd may have tried to quit on Friday, during the eight-hour hiatus between the Guardian approaching the Home Office with news of its latest leak and the former home secretary’s defiant tweets later that night.

Downing Street was in full “Operation Save May” mode, with her spokesman stressing that she would not have been expected to be across the detail of Home Office targets once she had left the department.

“The prime minister was aware when she was in office as home secretary of targets, but what the prime minister would have ceased to receive when she moved over to Downing Street was that sort of operational detail,” he said.

There were, unsurprisingly, warm words from No 10 about the new home secretary.

Sajid Javid is one of the most experienced ministers around the cabinet table. At housing he has proved his drive, his ambition and his determination to get to grips with difficult subjects and these are abilities that will be required at the home office.

It was also revealed that when May spoke to Javid this morning, they did discuss the Windrush scandal. “Providing support and resolving the issues that have been raised by Windrush are an absolute priority for the government,” her spokesman said.

But for those hoping that the whole affair might prompt a broader rethink of the government policy on immigration, No 10 was clear that she would stay the course.

10 Downing Street
10 Downing Street Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images

Updated

Theresa May rejects suggestion Rudd resigned over May's own policy decisions

Sky News has just broadcast a clip with Theresa May.

May started by paying tribute to Amber Rudd, echoing some of the things she said in her letter to Rudd last night.

Asked about the Home Office targets for the removal of illegal immigrants, May said:

Yes, there were targets in terms of removing people from the country who are here illegally.

Q: Shouldn’t you be taking personal responsibility?

May says Rudd resigned because of information she gave to the House of Commons that was not correct.

She says the government is responding to people’s concerns about illegal immigration.

But it is also addressing the problems faced by Windrush generation migrants.

  • May rejects suggestion Rudd resigned over May’s own policy decisions.

And Channel 4 News’ Gary Gibbon has a good blog on Javid’s appointment too. He thinks Javid’s arrival in the Home Office could tip the balance against the “customs partnership” proposal when the cabinet’s key Brexit decision making body - the EU exit and trade (strategy and negotiations) sub committee, or EUXT (SN) as it’s known - meets on Wednesday. Put simply, that could be awkward for Theresa May.

There is quite a lot of Brexit news around today. Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, is in Ireland, and there are some important votes on the EU withdrawal bill in the Lords. I will be turning to those soon.

In a good article for ConservativeHome, Paul Goodman argues that the appointment of Sajid Javid is a sign of Theresa May’s weakness. Here’s an extract, but do read the whole thing.

Sajid Javid is also a remainer – but there the resemblance ends. His approach to migration is instinctively liberal – or, to put it more accurately, business-friendly. He was part of the loose alliance of ministers who, when George Osborne was chancellor, wanted students to be taken out of the immigration figures.

Furthermore, he is not a May partisan. Javid is a former Osborne protege, was a supporter of Stephen Crabb’s leadership bid, and was not a shoo-in to be kept on by her in cabinet after she became prime minister. But Downing Street would have been nervous of sacking the only Muslim in cabinet, and so Javid was sent to housing, in the hope that his brains and energy would make an impact. As indeed they did: he was soon clashing with May over policy; he wanted a less cautious approach. After last summer’s election, he became bolder and more outspoken – leading the charge in cabinet, according to Tim Shipman, for the defenestration of Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill as chiefs of staff.

His appointment can thus only be read as a sign of prime ministerial weakness rather than strength. Javid will have clocked the central facts of Rudd’s tenure at the Home Office: that she favoured a more liberal immigration policy, and was therefore at odds with Theresa May’s legacy…but loyally shouldered the burden and carried it on, while making it known now and again that she didn’t really want to. This position was inherently problematic. It was ultimately made fatal by Rudd’s lack of strategic direction and attention to detail.

From the FT’s Jim Pickard

This is from ITV’s Paul Brand.

In an interview with Sky News, Sajid Javid also stressed that his overall priority as home secretary was keeping people safe.

My first priority is to make sure the Home Office does all it can to keep British people safe. That is a huge responsibility, something I take very, very seriously.

Asked if he would abandon the “hostile environment” strategy (as Labour is demanding - see 11.22am), Javid said that he wanted immigration policy to be fair and decent, but that this was what Amber Rudd was also proposing.

When he was asked what his parents would feel about his promotion, and his becoming the first BAME person to hold one of the great offices of state (traditionally defined as PM, chancellor, foreign secretary and home secretary), he said any parent would be really pleased to see their child become home secretary.

Sajid Javid
Sajid Javid Photograph: Sky News

Updated

Javid says making sure Windrush migrants treated 'with decency' his most urgent task as home secretary

Sajid Javid has been giving brief interviews to broadcasters.

He said his most urgent task was ensuring Windrush migrants get treated with decency.

The most urgent task I have is to help those British citizens who came from the Caribbean, the so-called Windrush generation, and make sure they are all treated with the decency and the fairness they deserve.

Updated

Labour says Javid must end 'hostile environment' policy

Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, has challenged Sajid Javid to end the policy of creating a “hostile environment” for immigrants. The government says the intention was only ever to create a “hostile environment” for illegal immigrants, but Abbott did not make that distinction in her statement. (The Labour case is that legal migrants are also affected by policy directed at illegal migrants.) Abbott said:

The change in home secretary will mean nothing unless Theresa May’s ‘hostile environment’ policy is finally brought to an end.

Sajid Javid’s first priority must be ending this ‘hostile environment’ policy. As the Windrush scandal has proven, and as some of us warned the government four years ago, this policy has ripped lives apart, including the lives of British nationals and others who have the right to be here.

The new home secretary cannot form another ‘human shield’ for Theresa May. The prime minister still has serious questions to answer about how this scandal was allowed to happen, and whether she knew Amber Rudd was misleading parliament and the public last week. It’s time Theresa May finally takes responsibility for the crisis she created.

Updated

Who is Sajid Javid? A round-up of some of the best profiles

At one point Sajid Javid was widely seen as a future prime minister. After a highly successful career in the City, he was elected MP for Bromsgrove in 2010 and within four years he was in the cabinet, as culture secretary. Javid got there despite starting life as the son of a Pakistani immigrant bus driver. “You wait for an immigrant bus driver’s son to turn up in politics, and then two turn up at once,” he once joked about his Labour contemporary, Sadiq Khan. Khan’s background probably helped broaden his appeal when he ran for election as mayor of London. But in the Conservative parliamentary party people with lived experience of working-class life, and BME disadvantage, are much rarer and Javid’s supporters argued that he had a life story that would be a huge asset in a leadership contest.

And Javid is ambitious. But, as he hit cabinet rank, an obvious problem in the ‘Javid for leader’ project became apparent. He was a dreadfully wooden speaker. Hopeless, in fact; the Maybot had nothing on the Javidbot. Over recent years his public performances have loosened up a bit, but the leadership talk started to fade as he proved himself to be a competent cabinet minister, but not an outstanding one. After culture he seemed more at home as business secretary, but when Theresa May became prime minister she shunted him into communities, a de facto demotion. In this post he failed to persuade Downing Street to back some of his more radical ideas on housebuilding, and his handling of the Grenfell Tower disaster has been criticised as ineffectual.

But in politics prospects can change very quickly and now he has the chance to prove himself in one of the biggest jobs in government - and one that he wanted. (See 9.59am.)

Here are four interviews or profiles that help to explain who he is, with extracts.

From an Andrew Rawnsley Observer column from 2014

He was a teenage Thatcherite, influenced by and sharing his father’s disgust with the Winter of Discontent and increasingly enthralled by the woman whom he calls “the greatest Conservative prime minister ever”. A portrait of the lady in blue hangs on his office wall. He is a self-described Thatcherite first and a Conservative second. He sends his children to private schools. He has a taste for Havana cigars. In common with many of Thatcher’s children of his Tory generation, he is as dry as dust on economic issues and well to the right on most other subjects.

This makes his a disorientating story for many on the left because it confounds their expectations of how someone from that background ought to think and where they should end up. Rather than acknowledge that there is any cause for celebration in a self-made Asian man with a working-class background reaching the cabinet, Labour MPs have jeered at him for being rich and not being a woman.

From a Robert Booth profile for the Guardian in 2014

During 20 years in banking, Javid became rich. According to unconfirmed reports, he made up to £3m a year through the years of boom and bust and he now owns a £4m home in Fulham and another worth £2m in Chelsea. He sends his children to private schools.

“I readily admit that being seen as an investment banker was not the most useful thing on the campaign trail,” he said in his maiden speech to parliament. “But it helped prepare me for a profession not well liked by the general public.”

From an Andrew Gimson profile for ConservativeHome in 2015

As a student, Javid wanted Thatcher to be more radical. Along with Tim Montgomerie, who would go on to found ConHome, he set up the Exeter Enterprise Forum, which extolled the virtues of the free market. But not all their time was devoted to campaigning: Montgomerie has “forgotten how many Star Trek movies we’ve watched together”.

In 1990, Javid went to the Conservative party conference and was thrown out of the Bournemouth International Centre for standing at the bottom of the escalators handing out leaflets opposing British membership of the Exchange Rate Mechanism, which he predicted, quite correctly, would be a disaster.

From a Fraser Nelson interview for the Spectator from 2017

Just before Christmas, Sajid Javid performed a ritual he has observed twice a year throughout his adult life: he read the courtroom scene in The Fountainhead. To Ayn Rand fans, it’s famous: the hero declares his principles and his willingness to be imprisoned for them if need be. As a student, Javid read the passage to his now-wife, but only once — she told him she’d have nothing more to do with him if he tried it again. ‘It’s about the power of the individual,’ he says. ‘About sticking up for your beliefs, against popular opinion. Being that individual that really believes in something and goes for it.’

This last anecdote may help to explain why Javid was in effect demoted when May became prime minister. At the time May’s most powerful adviser was Nick Timothy and he once wrote a column attacking “the libertarians who make it a mark of their ideological machismo that they quote Ayn Rand, whose heroic character Howard Roark boasted in The Fountainhead: ‘I recognise no obligations toward men except one: to respect their freedom.’ No wonder our opponents feel they can accuse us of callousness.” Timothy wrote that in March 2016, and it is hard not to think that he had Javid in mind when he did.

Updated

Penny Mordaunt takes over Rudd's responsibilities as minister for women and equalities

And Penny Mordaunt, the international development secretary, will take on additional responsibilities in this mini reshuffle, Number 10 has announced. She will get the minister for women and equalities role that Amber Rudd combined with being home secretary.

James Brokenshire becomes housing and communities secretary

Number 10 has confirmed the appointment of James Brokenshire as housing secretary.

Brokenshire was Northern Ireland secretary until he resigned in January because he was receiving medical treatment to remove a tumour on his lung. But the operation was successful and he has been recovering well.

Labour says Javid should come to Commons this afternoon to give statement on Windrush

Labour says it wants Sajid Javid to come to the Commons this afternoon to explain how he will fix the Windrush scandal. This is from Labour Whips, an official party account.

This is from Alan Travis, the Guardian’s home affairs editor until very recently.

This is from the Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn.

Sajid Javid has just left Number 10. He did not comment as he got into his waiting ministerial car, but he was smiling (sort of).

And here is the official statement from Number 10.

The Queen has been pleased to approve the appointment of the Rt Hon Sajid Javid MP as Secretary of State for the Home Department.

Sajid Javid appointed home secretary, No 10 announces

Sky’s Adam Boulton says the new home secretary is in Downing Street now. And it’s a man, he says.

So it won’t be Karen Bradley, the Northern Ireland secretary seen as a possible candidate because Theresa May trusts her a great deal and regards her highly. And Jacob Rees-Mogg’s bizarre Nicky Morgan tip (see 9.29am) hasn’t materialised.

This is from the Spectator’s James Forsyth.

You have to be brave or foolish to make firm predictions when an appointment is imminent. This is from the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope.

This is from Sky’s Beth Rigby.

This is from Sky’s Faisal Islam.

Here is the Sun’s Steve Hawkes on speculation that Sajid Javid, the housing secretary, will be made home secretary.

Until now there has been no evidence that Theresa May is a great admirer of Javid’s talent. He was business secretary when she became prime minister but, in what was seen as a de facto demotion, she moved him to the more low profile post of communities secretary (the job he does now, although housing has since been added to his title.)

But the one big argument in favour of Javid is that he is the son of immigrants. He would be the first BME home secretary, and his appointment could potentially recalibrate the government’s relationship with migrant communities. In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph yesterday he practically auditioned for the job.

This is from Sky’s Lewis Goodall.

Kevin Rudd, the former prime minister of Australia, is in London today. On Twitter he has been joking about the newspaper headlines.

The BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg has got an interesting thread on the ‘who might succeed Amber Rudd?’ issue. It starts here.

Stephen Doughty, a Labour member of the Commons home affairs committee, told the Today programme in an interview that he thought Theresa May would have known that Amber Rudd was not telling the truth on Wednesday afternoon when Rudd told the committee the Home Office did not have deportation targets. When asked this question (which left Chris Grayling struggling - see 9.09am), Doughty replied:

I do suspect that Theresa May knew [what Rudd said was not true].

Rudd, of course, went to the Commons on Thursday morning to admit that what she had said was wrong.

On his LBC phone-in Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Conservative Brexiter and chair of the European Research Group, which represents Tory MPs pushing for a harder Brexit, said that he thought Theresa May might want to maintain “Brexit balance” when she appoints a successor to Amber Rudd. He said:

The prime minister has a lot of good and able people she can choose from but there are issues relating to the Brexit balance. She may go for someone like Nicky Morgan to maintain the balance in the party.

But Chris Grayling, the leave-voting transport secretary, told the Today programme in his interview earlier that he did not think this was so much of an issue. He said:

We are now a government that is united in wanting to deliver the best outcome for Britain in Brexit. Okay, we have some debates and discussions about how we get there.

But I think what’s most important is she gives the right person this job because it is much more than the Brexit negotiations. It’s about security and it’s about the safety of our citizens.

Twenty activists from the organisation Global Justice Now unfurled banners outside the Home Office just after 8am this morning saying “End The Hostile Environment” and “No Human Is Illegal”.

The activists said that the hostile environment issue was a far bigger one than just the impact on the Windrush generation.

Home Office security guards looked on as the activists displayed their banners outside the entrance to the Home Office HQ in London’s Marsham Street and handed out leaflets to Home Office staff on their way into work demanding an end to the hostile environment.

The activists chanted “Human not Hostile” and “People not Passports”.

Activist Aisha Dodwell said: “We want the Home Office to realise that this is not just about the Windrush generation but about making the UK a welcoming place for migrants.”

Another activist Nick Dearden said: “The Home Office has made life so intolerable here for migrants that they don’t want to stay here. We need to adopt a totally different approach to migration.”

Global Justice Now activists expressed concern about the impact of the hostile environment policy which denies some migrants access to basic needs such as housing, employment and healthcare. They say this has turned doctors, employers and landlords into border guards, and people live in constant fear of deportation.

They have urged people to email the Home Office calling for an end to the hostile environment.

Demonstrators protest against the hostile environment immigration policy outside the Home Office in Westminster, London.
Demonstrators protest against the hostile environment immigration policy outside the Home Office in Westminster, London. Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

Updated

Morning summary

Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, taking over from Jamie Grierson.

Here’s where things stand this morning.

  • Sajid Javid, the housing secretary, is being touted as the favourite to replace Amber Rudd as home secretary. Theresa May is due to appoint someone later today. Ladbrokes have him as the clear favourite. Bookies’ odds can be hopelessly unreliable on matters like this (where little or no money has been bet, they basically make them up), but ITV’s political editor, Robert Peston, thinks this tip is a sound one.

Chris Grayling, the transport secretary (and an outside tip for next home secretary), told the Today programme a few minutes ago that he had “no idea” who would get the job.

  • Labour has said that Rudd’s resignation means Theresa May must now face questions about her role in the Windrush affair. Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, made this argument in an interview on the Today programme this morning. (See 7.14am.) She said:

All roads lead back to Theresa May and her tenure as home secretary. Many of the elements of this hostile environment originated under Theresa May and, most important of all, it was in 2014 that she passed legislation which removed the protection from deportation which up until then had applied to Commonwealth citizens.

Labour wants May to make a statement in the Commons this afternoon. That request seems doomed to failure - there is no obligation on prime ministers to make statements when ministers resign, and Chris Grayling responded to this demand by saying Labour could question May at PMQs on Wednesday - but the demand highlights how May is now becoming the target. When Nick Robinson repeatedly put it to Grayling on the Today programme this morning that, as a former home secretary, May must have known that what Rudd said on Wednesday to the Commons home affairs committee about the Home Office not having deportation targets was untrue, Grayling struggled to give a convincing denial. (See 8.27am.) This is from the barrister and legal blogger Matthew Scott.

  • Damian Hinds, the education secretary, has explicitly talked up the prospect of Rudd being able to return to government. (See 7.47am) It sounded as if his words were sanctioned by Downing Street, amplifying the hint that Theresa May give in her letter to Rudd last night about the possibility of Rudd staging a ministerial comeback in the future. These messages may be intended to minimise the chances of Rudd joining the pro-European Brexit rebels.
  • Abbott has rejected claims that Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party can be blamed in any way for the “hostile environment” policies that have made life difficult for some Windrush generation migrants. Ministers have repeatedly argued that it was the last Labour government that started to tighten rules requiring people to show they are in the UK lawfully. When this was put to Abbott in her Today interview, she replied:

The Labour party is under new management now. We are under new management. We take issues about human rights and fair rules and reasonable management of migration very seriously.

Diane Abbott and Jeremy Corbyn
Diane Abbott and Jeremy Corbyn Photograph: Amer Ghazzal/REX/Shutterstock

Updated

The targets for removing illegal immigrants that encouraged officials to deport anyone they could - including those who were entitled to live here such as the Windrush generation.

Grayling replies:

The prime minister has apologised and we’ve put in place mechanisms to sort this out as quickly as we can... That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t target illegal immigration.

Updated

Rudd wrote to the prime minister promising to increase by 10% the number of removals, how can she say she didn’t know about targets?

Grayling replies:

“Those who know Amber Rudd know she would never knowingly mislead a House of Commons committee.”

Would Theresa May have known that what Rudd said to MPs was not true?

The current prime minister has not been home secretary for an extensive period, she would not know exactly what is happening in the Home Office today.

But she would have known about targets for deportation?

You’re talking about operational targets on the ground in individual teams, ministers don’t see what’s happening in every corner of their department all of the time, so I can’t judge the situation two or three years ago.

Updated

Did Rudd not know what was happening in her own department?

Clearly, she felt, given what she said at the time, given what’s come out since, the letter that was leaked on Friday, work that’s come out over the weekend to look at what else is happening around these targets, she’s come to the view that she should have known more, that she didn’t and she’s got to take responsibility for that. I’m sorry that she’s gone but this is a decision of somebody who acted in good faith, found she got it wrong and took a decision to step down.

Updated

Chris Grayling, former justice secretary, is speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

What does “inadvertently misled” mean?

She made a mistake. She was not fully aware of the detail or the way on the ground operationally the regime operated to remove illegal immigrants from the country, there are local operational targets to do so … it’s really important to stress this is illegal immigration.

Chris Grayling.
Chris Grayling. Photograph: Victoria Jones/PA

Updated

Damian Hinds, the education secretary, has told the Today programme that he understands why Amber Rudd decided to step down but hopes she will return to the cabinet in the future.

Is he expecting the call up?

The prime minister will be making the decision on how to move forward and I look forward to working with the new home secretary on all the really important things we are working with the Home Office on.

Updated

One of the favourites tipped to succeed Amber Rudd as home secretary is Sajid Javid.

In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, the current communities secretary, whose parents emigrated from Pakistan in the Sixties, said that upon learning about the treatment of the post-war Windrush migrants:

I thought that could be my mum ... my dad ... my uncle ... it could be me.

The interview could emerge as well-timed, particularly considering Rudd’s belief, expressed before she stepped down, that the Home Office had “lost sight of the individual”.

Updated

I’m handing over to my colleague Jamie Grierson now who will take you through what promises to be a busy morning in Westminster. Thanks for reading.

Updated

Some more reaction.

Updated

Green avoids answering a question about whether Rudd’s replacement should be another remainer. The PM needs to appoint someone who is an “effective home secretary”, he says, and that will be her main concern.

Updated

Damian Green, a former Tory immigration minister, is on now. He accepts Rudd had to go.

He says some immigrants of the Windrush generation are right to feel the system has let them down but says there are other immigrants who are here illegally.

Updated

Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, is on the Today programme right now. She says that fundamentally Rudd had to resign because of the Windrush fiasco.

She says Labour MPs want to question Theresa May in the Commons today about her role in shaping the controversial “hostile environment” immigration policy. Labour is under new management, she says, and take the management of human rights “very seriously”, countering a suggestion that the party started the ball rolling on the controversial policy when in power before 2010. But Labour now wants to know what the basis was of the policy.

Updated

Many Tories have been paying tribute to Amber Rudd, among them some of her possible successors in the Home Office hotseat:

And some not so much:

As well as the issue of who takes over from Rudd, another big question today will be about Theresa May’s own role in designing the harsh immigration policies that her hapless home secretary was left to defend. The prime minister was at the Home Office for six years and was behind much of the “hostile environment” policy that led to the Windrush debacle.

Labour and the Lib Dems have called for her to appear in the Commons today and explain the resignation and why the government has ended up trying to hound out of the country people who are perfectly entitled to live here.

Our political editor Heather Stewart says May has now lost her human shield with the departure of Rudd, arguing that the home secretary had survived a week of attacks because 1) she was popular with cabinet colleagues and 2) she was a lightning rod for criticism that would otherwise have rained down on her boss. Here’s Heather piece in full:

Our columnist Isabel Hardman has also written about the May/Rudd axis:

Updated

If you want to know more about Amber Rudd, the now former home secretary, there is this excellent profile of her by our political reporter Anne Perkins.

The Tory mood might be as miserable as the weather across much of Britian this morning, but early birds from the other side are chirping away on social media. Former Labour cabinet minister Andrew Adonis invokes Animal Farm.

While the Mirror’s Kevin Maguire takes a more head-on approach:

Updated

While we’re warming up, there’s a slew of excellent articles to read about Rudd’s resignation and the Windrush scandal that forced her to go.

The Guardian reporter who has led the story, Amelia Gentleman, explains how her low-key investigation grew into a national scandal.

There’s also the killer letter unearthed by our investigative team yesterday that appears to have finally forced Rudd to realise she had to go.

What the papers are saying ...

The news of Amber Rudd’s resignation dropped late in the evening, forcing some editors to scrap their original front pages and redraw them.

The best puns of the night go to the Mirror’s “Good Ruddance” and the Sun’s “Ruddy, steady, go”.

The other papers were more prosaic. The Times and Metro kept it short and pithy with: “Rudd resigns” and “Rudd quits” respectively.

The Express ponders what Rudd’s exit will mean for the prime minister. The paper says Theresa May is now “facing the biggest political crisis of her premiership”.

The Mail agrees, saying the resignation is a “huge blow” to May. The Guardian leads with “Rudd quits over Windrush scandal”, saying the home secretary’s dramatic departure came as she struggled to account for her role in the unjust treatment of Windrush citizens.

The Telegraph says “Rudd quits as leaked letter leaves her denial in tatters”, citing the private letter written by Rudd to May as the reason for the resignation.

One the big questions today is who Theresa May will appoint in Amber Rudd’s place? Will it be Jeremy Hunt? Michael Gove? Sajid Javid? Robert Peston tweeted last night that she could do worse than pick former Labour cabinet minister Yvette Cooper. Quite an outlier, you’d have to say. Here are the contenders:

And this what Ladbrokes has to say on the matter:

Hello, I’m Martin Farrer and I’ll be taking you through the first part of the morning as we follow the developments after the resignation of home secretary Amber Rudd.

Here is what we know so far:

  • Rudd said she quit because she now accepted that she should have been aware that the Home Office had targets for the removal of illegal immigrants. On Wednesday she told the home affairs committee that such targets did not exist. On Thursday she admitted they did exist, but claimed not to have known about them. On Friday, after the Guardian published evidence that her office had been told about the targets, she claimed that she had not seen the particular leaked document in question. Tonight, after a more thorough review of her ministerial paper trail, she accepted that she should have known about the information sent to her office mentioning targets.
  • May is expected to appoint a replacement to Rudd today. She will want to appoint someone with the authority and ability to defuse the Windrush scandal, while being mindful of the need not to upset the cabinet’s delicate Brexit balance. (The home secretary sits on the cabinet’s 11-strong key Brexit decision making body, the EU exit and trade [strategy and negotiation] sub committee, and Rudd was one of the members pushing most strongly for a softer Brexit.)
  • Labour and the Lib Dems have called on May to come to the Commons to make a statement about Rudd’s resignation and the Windrush debacle. Rudd’s departure poses a significant threat to May because May herself when she was home secretary introduced many of the measures that have led to Windrush migrants losing jobs or benefits, or facing the threat of deportation, but until now Rudd has shouldered much of the blame.
  • Rudd has used her resignation letter to confirm that the Home Office is preparing emergency legislation to protect the rights of the Windrush generation. In a significant admission, Rudd also referred to it as “the Windrush scandal” in her letter.
  • In her reply, May suggested that Rudd could return to government in due course. “I know that you have a great contribution still to make to national life, and look forward to seeing you do so,” the prime minister wrote.

Updated

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